Nothing is more satisfying than having a spook confirmed by a hardcore sceptic.

Last weekend my dad and I went off on a flying adventure in his two-seater airplane. Destination: the ‘Montrose Fly-In’, an annual event that takes place in Montrose, a medium-sized town on the east coast of Scotland, not far from where my dad grew up.

Held at the former site of RAF Montrose, dozens of light aircraft land every year to celebrate the rich aviation history of the site, which was Britain’s first operational military airfield.

This was to be a slightly poignant trip, as it might be our last one to Scotland together. Carnegie Senior, at the grand young age of 82, is slowing down on an illustrious 66-year flying career, which has seen him go from an 20something RAF officer stationed in Africa and the Middle East during the 1960s, to Luton Airport in the 80s and 90s, where he flew as an airline pilot for Britannia Airlines (now Tui).

Not interested in sport, Dad flew the England football team a few ideas and was nonplussed when Paul Ince and Paul Gascoigne visited the cockpit on one occasion to introduce themselves. The former Paul chaperoning the latter one, who’d appeared to have been making the most of the miniatures. Ah, when sport was full of fun.

Penguins

One of my favourite flying tales of dad’s, apart from when a planeload of emperor penguins bound for London Zoo broke loose on a plane (it actually happened to a colleague of his) was a Britannia cabin crew manager once mispronouncing his name in the pre-flight service announcement, telling the 300-odd passengers on board they were in the safe hands of “Captain Carnage.” Sit back and enjoy the flight guys.

Back to the ghosts. Like any good ghost-fluencer (say it! GHOST-FLEW-ENCER), wherever I go now, I automatically Google ghost stories. Scotland has a murderous, blood-soaked past, so I was expecting it to deliver the goods.

But instead of a slain battalion chief, I was both surprised and delighted to discover Montrose Air Museum as it is now called - the place we were flying into - has its very own ghost!

The spirit of Lieutenant Desmond Arthur of the Royal Flying Corps (before it became the RAF) is said to haunt the site, after being wrongly blamed when his B.E.2 biplane broke apart in midair on the 27th May 1913, shortly after taking off from the airfield, sending the doomed Lt Arthur plunging to his death.

The finger of blame

An initial government report the same year suggested the crash had been Arthur’s fault, citing “dangerous flying” and “foolishness.” An experienced pilot from No 2 Squadron held in high regard, the damning condemnation was at odds with Arthur’s reputation.

Shortly after, stories started circulating reports about a ghostly figure at the Montrose base. Officers began reporting a figure in a flying suit walking the path toward the officers’ mess. The man would reach the door and open it, only to vanish into thin air.

Other phenomena was reported. Mysterious footsteps, disembodied mumbling, the sound of a phantom plane flying overhead. As word of the ghost spread, the Air Ministry was pressured to reopen the case. Amazingly, they did.

A second inquiry concluded that the crash hadn’t been Lt Arthur’s fault. The right wing had previously been damaged and covered up with amateur repairs. Arthur hadn't stood a chance.

In 1916 the government officially reversed its decision, fully exonerating him. Arthur’s spirit was allegedly seen one more time that year on Christmas Eve before vanishing, apparently satisfied his final mission to clear his name had been accomplished.

Phantom passenger

Or maybe not… The story reared up again in the 1970s, following an article in Flight International magazine, by the aviation journalist and former British Airports Authority chairman Sir Peter Masefield. In it, Masefield told about taking off from nearby Dundee Airport bound for Montrose and being approached by a man, who’d asked for a lift in the back of Masefield’s light aircraft.

As the plane approached its destination, Masefield was astonished to encounter an antiquated biplane in his sights, flying over the site of the old airfield. He watched in horror as the plane’s right wing collapsed and the pilot fell from the cockpit. At the same time, there was a cry from his previously silent passenger. Masefield turned round, but the back seat was empty.

Badly shaken, he landed briefly at his intended spot before quickly flying onwards. When Masefield wrote up his logbook later on, he saw that the date was 27 May 1963 - exactly 50 years since Desmond Arthur’s fatal accident.

No scaremongering TikToker, Masefield was a credible witness and a heavyweight in an industry not known to humour ghosts (I should know, I’ve met enough of them). Had he witnessed a re-enactment of the 1913 tragedy? Masefield was clearly so convinced by his experience to go public and write about it.

In 2010 the ghost hit the headlines again, after an old unplugged radio in the now museum began broadcasting speeches by Winston Churchill and music by the Glenn Miller Orchestra, the Allies favourite band during the Second World War. After Lt Arthur’s time yes, but who knows?

Well, this was better than any old ghost of a bloodsoaked Braveheart. Excited but expecting absolutely nothing, I messaged my dad.

Have you heard of the Montrose ghost?

The reply came back.

Yes.

Firstly, I was astounded he’d actually replied. But shock number two, the world’s biggest sceptic hadn’t - excuse the crass pun - shot me down in flames!

The next message took me even more by surprise.

I wrote about it in my book.*

*He actually revealed this in a subsequent conversation, but as a fellow author he’ll understand the artistic license.

Shiver my Air Force One timbers!

Next time on AYOG - The Ghost of Montrose. Told from the man who doesn't believe in them!

AND I can confirm - we did see the ghost! In a chilling twist, there was a link to the Carnegie clan I’d never imagined…

Until then, stay ghosty - and off the miniatures!

Jo x

Still no real rain on the horizon.

Is anyone else starting to feel like they're living in the Britney Spears I’m a Slave For U video? For you unfamiliar with the concept (i.e: my dad, who I recently discovered does actually read every AYOG), it features the American pop artist and her dancers in an apocalyptically hot landscape, desperate for rain and water.

In fact, here’s the link for the video because underwear as outerwear aside, it’s vintage Britney away from all the bad stuff and great for perking up your Sunday vibe. #TeamBritney

A terrifying tidy up

I had an interesting supernatural chat with a young person this week. I have to be careful when I talk to children about ghosts because well, they are children. But along with animals, they’re meant to be the most susceptible to sensing spirits and are therefore a paranormal goldmine.

Luckily this YP was more than happy to talk about her family house, which she is convinced is haunted. Doors mysteriously open and close when she is home alone. Her house is also old. Playing devil’s advocate, I pointed out that old houses do creak and shift without any paranormal hand at work.

Yes she said, before going on to tell me about the time she was in the living room and heard the front door open. Her dad was expected home later, so she went out to see why he was back early. No one was there. Her dad wasn’t home. The front door was still locked.

“I heard that front door open,” she told me resolutely. And I have to admit, front doors are hard to get wrong aren’t they? We all know the sound of our front door opening. Until we don’t.

There have been other instances. Another time she arrived home, opening the back door with the key from the lockbox. Her brother was due shortly afterwards, so as arranged, she replaced the key in the lockbox, left the back door open and went upstairs to take a shower.

When she emerged, she had messages and calls from her brother asking why she’d locked him out. Going downstairs, she discovered the back door mysteriously locked again.

Maybe it was a security conscious ghost, I offered.

Maybe she said, before finishing with the finale. A few years ago, she had been ill with a heavy cold. One night she lay in bed, the lights off. She was trying to sleep but her nose kept running.

“I was blowing my nose and throwing the tissues onto the floor beside my bed,” she told me. “When all of sudden, one was thrown back at me.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I mean, I threw a tissue and it was thrown back at me.” She pointed. “It landed on my chest.”

“Weird!” I said. “What did you think?”

Unsurprisingly, she hadn't liked it. And from what I could make out, hadn't chucked snotty tissues on the floor again.

Although no nine-year-old wants things thrown at them out of the darkness by a spectral hand, the incident did make me smile. Dead or alive, some people have standards. As children, we learn our manners from our parents and older role models. I’d just never considered one of them could be a 200-year-old ghost.

Until next time, wishing you cooling goosebumps.

Jo x

The dead always give you what you want. This week I was pondering on a theme to write about when my friend V sent me a link for something called London Month of The Dead. Don’t know if this will be of any interest to you, she wrote. Dear V, I replied. Does a bear/Pope’s balcony etc…

London Month of The Dead runs from October through to November and there are a smorgasbord of deathly delights on offer. A Day At The Undertakers! Pest Houses of London! Emergency Mortuaries! The Dead of St Pancras! Bound In Skin! and possibly my absolute favourite, The Mindbenders of Mayfair - Satanic Swinging London.

I could go on, but death aside it looks like a fascinating historical dunk into our capital, with a couple of ghosts and vampires thrown in. Tickets went on sale today and things are already getting booked out London Month Of The Dead (see you at the swingfest)

Scary Mary

As the heat marathon continues (did anyone else have fifty seconds of light rain today?), we turn to ever inventive ways to cool down. Face fans, A/C units, sun brollies and the surprising number of people papering their windows with tin foil, making them look like they know something the rest of us don’t about the aliens coming.

Is this you? Do you know something we should be aware of? Aside the fact it has slight mad Joe Wicks from EastEnders vibes, I am genuinely fascinated: does tin-foiling your windows actually work?

I, on the other hand, have my own method of madness. I always find a good ghost story is an excellent way to cool one’s temperature. BBC’s Uncanny are running a summer special and yesterday I was listening the latest podcast episode about a hospital haunted by the spirit of ‘Scary Mary’, an unkempt-haired elderly woman with an intense stare.

Scary Mary has appeared through the decades to various medical staff including most recently, walking past in the background of someone’s screen on a Teams call (scream).

Intrigued, I googled to see if anyone else had experienced paranormal activity on a video call. There are quite a few reports of disembodied voices and whispers that shouldn't be there, but this has also been put down to unstable internet connections, technical glitches, environmental noises and the like.

There’s also something called Zombie Calls, where Teams calls go through and connect to other people at strange times like the middle of the night, when neither are logged on and are presumably asleep. Again, the official explanation blames bugs and glitches, but who knows?

Who you gonna call?

People have long reported hearing the voice of their deceased loved ones over the airwaves, or receiving messages from a phone after the person has died. Electronic Voice Phenomena, or EVP, is a popular technique used amongst ghost hunters to try and communicate with the dead.

The theory is that entities are made up of pure energy and use the electrical charge in phones and other appliances to communicate with us. You may never look at your microwave in the same way again.

It reminds me of the time in the early 2000s, when I was living with my friend J in south west London. There was a landline phone in my bedroom, one of those long oblong ones that sat in a cradle. But even back then mobiles had taken over, I had a Cath Kidston floral-print flip one that seemed the height of sophistication.

Everyone called me on that, even my parents. J was the same with his phone, I don’t know even know if we had the landline number. It was just a thing that was there in my room. All I know is that I never remember using it and it rarely rang.

Until one night. J was out and I was home alone. I think I must have been in the kitchen, because I suddenly heard an unfamiliar loud, strident noise coming from my room. Running down the corridor, I discovered the landline was ringing. I picked it up.

‘Hello?’ I said, expecting a wrong number or someone trying to sell something.

Instead it was a woman’s voice, but it sounded like she was under water. She was speaking really slowly and densely, but I still couldn’t make it out. The tone was insistent, like she had something to say.

‘Hello?’ I said again. ‘Who’s that?’

The voice continued, muffled and strangulated. It sounded like it was really hard work, as if she was trying to shout through a mouth of treacle.

All of a sudden, I felt really weird. I didn’t like it. I slammed the phone down. A few seconds later, I picked it up again and listened gingerly. Normal dialling tone.

The phone didn't ring again.

That strange, strangulated voice drifts across my mind from time to time. Technical glitch? Signal interference? Or Something Else? Yes, I was a highly imaginative 20something who’d probably just got into Most Haunted for the first time, but there was something about it. It felt like… something from somewhere different. As I said, I didn’t like it.

The other theory, which I have considered, is that someone had been kidnapped and managed to get to a phone/pay phone and in their blind panic, had dialled the wrong number and had the misfortune of getting me.

Like I say, it could have been a BT problem. But something was off. I’ve never had anything like it since. Maybe the dead know not to call me. Or anyone who gets kidnapped.

Has anyone else had any paranormal phone calls? Do you have your own Teams tale of terror? Call me! Even if I don’t pick up.

Until next time, stay ghosty.

Jo x

When it comes to the supernatural, the emphasis is often on the ghastly, the ghoulish and things that go bump in the night. What lies beyond the veil is billed as monstrous, macabre and malevolent. But alongside the tales of terror exists a sweeter, more comforting side to the afterlife: one based in pure essence and enduring love.

And that is where our deceased pets and our bonds with them, come in.

I adored my little dog Effie. Part Jack Russell, part fluffy racoon, she had the gentlest nature you could ever wish for. Effie, or Eff Off as she was fondly known, was my little mate and first real love. She was with me through some of the biggest challenges of my life: there for the good times as well as the bad. She was always by my side - or should I say on my lap – as she was such a tactile, affectionate little dog.

And not just with me. I was once working in a coffee shop when I realised Eff was no longer on the bench seat next to me. She’d shuffled two tables down to sit with an older man, nestled under his arm while he talked to a woman sat opposite him, I assume his wife.

I quickly apologised. He assured me I didn’t need to. ‘You’ve got a lovely little dog there,’ he told me, adding, ‘We still miss ours.’ Effie, like many dogs, always knew who needed comfort.

I was devastated when she died unexpectedly in August 2022, following dental extraction under anaesthesia at our local vets. Shortly afterwards I flew on a planned trip to Geneva to visit friends, sobbing behind sunglasses on a packed EasyJet flight.

My friends embraced me with kindness, good food and company, but the heartbreak was mine alone. I was staying in the spare bedroom on the first floor of their modern, pet-free home. The room was simply furnished: granite floors with a raised bed you could see under, with two bedside tables and a mirrored wardrobe.

That first night I lay in the double bed, the unfamiliar house dark and quiet around me. Staring blindly at the ceiling, I regurgitated the painful reality my little Eff Off was no longer on this earth. Something I’d always known was coming of course, but not now, not like this. I lay there, tears streaming quietly down my face. She was gone.

‘Oh Eff’, I said emptily. ‘What will I do without you?’

So paralysed was I with misery, I can’t recall whether it happened at that exact moment, or a few moments later. Beyond my tears, I felt something light jump up on the bottom left hand side of the bed, nearest to the door.

My stomach turned over, body reacting instinctively before my brain kicked in. Oh shit I thought, a wild animal’s got in. My friends lived on the edge of a pretty Swiss village. The house was very secure and my friend had locked up when we’d gone to bed, but had something managed to get in without any of us seeing?

Heart racing, I jumped up and switched on the light beside the door. But instead of being confronted by a slightly feral, frightened fox, there was… nothing.

Then it registered. My bedroom door was closed. We were on the first floor. It was just me, in an empty room.

I checked inside the wardrobe, just to be sure. There was nothing there. I knew I hadn’t dreamed or imagined it: I had been wide awake with grief and disbelief.

But now alongside it, somehow the deep knowing that the physical sensation I’d just felt had been my dog. Effie had come to give me comfort, the way she always had. No longer able to feel the warmth of her body, I could feel her warmth in my broken, desolate heart.

That was a turning point for me. In the midst of that exquisite, raw grief, a new, incredible depth to our bond was opened up. Eff might not be here in her physical form but her essence, her intrinsic sweetness, was still here.

‘I’m still here mum’

I asked around to see if anyone else had experienced something similar after their pet had passed. A few people got in touch, including D.

‘The day after my little dog Scout died five years ago, I went to my friend’s house. She was telling me about the song Chasing Cars, that reminds her of the dog that she lost. When I got home and walked in, out of nowhere Alexa started playing Chasing Cars.

It was the weirdest thing, especially as I didn’t take my phone with me, so it hadn’t been listening or anything like that. My friend couldn’t believe it. It wasn’t even a song I’d ever listened to on Alexa before. I knew it was Scout, telling me not to be sad and that he was ok. He was the sweetest boy and I still miss him daily.’

My friend L, a resolute cynic, had their beloved elderly cocker spaniel put to sleep in the garden of their family home, earlier this year. Afterwards a patch of wild flowers started inexplicably growing on the exact patch of green lawn where he’d passed on. L can’t explain it. ‘I definitely believe it’s him,’ she messaged, ‘Even though I don’t believe in that stuff!’

M told of a beloved family cat who followed them to a new home.

‘Our rescue cat Woody died a couple of months after we moved into our (then) new house and it was so hard, because we didn't have many memories of him there and we couldn't go back to our old flat where all our memories were. But a few times I've been in the kitchen and in my peripheral vision seen a big old tortoisehell cat (he was 8kg!) plodding down the hallway towards me. Every time I turn round he's gone, but I know it's him.’

We know our animals. Just as I knew that small, light weight jumping on my bed that night was Effie, because I’d experienced it hundreds of times before.

There have been other incidents since: synchronicities, coincidences, who cares? It’s the meaning you put on it and how you feel in that moment. Eff’s essence is always with me. I just have to remember to tune in.

Our pets soften us and open us up. When they leave us it’s so easy for our poor, broken hearts to take refuge and shut down, but once the initial, agonising grief has passed, we must, must, open them again. Our pets teach us how to love and they show us unconditional love. That love, although so hard to imagine at the time, is just that – unconditional. It never leaves.

Energy is inextinguishable – physics tells us that. It can’t be stopped and it can’t break. Love is energy, in its purest form. It’s the biggest thing any of us will ever feel and yet the one thing we can’t physically measure or prove. So you have to be able to step into something. Love can’t die and it can’t be killed. It just moves to a different dimension, although one that is far closer than we think.

There’s no time limit for grief. It doesn’t matter how long ago it happened, if you can feel past the pain to that love in your heart, you can still feel your pet.

We still have a relationship with our animals once they pass on. We still need to put that love somewhere, carry on the conversations and routines we always had. Grief may block that for a time, but once your heart can open again, albeit with new scar tissue, that love is always there, waiting patiently for you.

Anticipatory grief for our pets is also a big one. I used to dread the day Effie would no longer be with me, and it’s the agonising trade-off for pet owners. I’ll be talking about that in the next AYOG and some ways we can transform that grief, if that’s something that might help you.

If you are grieving your pet friend right now, or know someone who is, I’m sending all the love. Maybe memories are enough. Maybe you don’t believe in anything after physical death and finite endings are healthy and perfectly ok. Or, maybe, you feel your pet’s presence around you in ways you just know are them.

What is certain is that we loved our pets and they loved us. And that’s something that can never be taken away.

Terror at the beach

I went to Cornwall last week and glorious it was too. True to form, my vampiric self was slathered in factor 1000 and skulking under a sun shelter on the beach, expertly assembled in high winds by the Retired Fireman.

My dress was hanging on the tent drying, after getting soaked in a rogue wave incident. The RF and I lay there like a pair of sardines, sun warming our legs, sounds of the surf in the distance. For once my mind felt as empty as the sky. It was blissful. After a while the RF spoke. ‘Your dress looks really spooky. Like it’s out to get us.’

After that, it was all I could think of. You know what I mean? You’re never off duty with the spirits. With that, I shall leave you. Stay ghosty – and don’t look above you!

Jo x

Judith Chalmers is coming in live. I’m currently sat by a pool in Spain, on a weekend away with the girls. The villa, halfway between Malaga and Marbella, is a quintessentially charming affair, furnished with tasteful neutrals and riotous clumps of plush pink Bougainvillea.

The temperature’s a tidy 34 degrees, the sky is empty and a perfect blue. Yesterday we lunched by the beach, a sun-dappled chic affair, helped along with lashings of pale pink rosé.

Prickly heat aside, everyone’s at their best in Spain: the colours are bright, the days (and nights) are long, light and hazy. But as I sit here now, the sun warming my grateful toes, my thoughts inevitably drift towards ghosts.

Spain is a country as old as time, with its fair share of murder, mystery and intrigue. What lurks beneath the sunny skies, easy vibe and sparkling seas? Welcome to your whistlestop tour of the haunted places of the Costa del Sol….

Macabre Malaga

Cortijo Jurado, Málaga outskirts.

Widely considered one of the most haunted houses in Spain, the abandoned 19th-century agricultural estate was built by the wealthy Heredia family. The striking neo-Gothic mansion has 365 windows, one for each day of the year.

Local legend claims that between 1890 and 1920, young women mysteriously disappeared from the surrounding area. Rumours claim the estate covers a network of underground torture chambers and tunnels used by wealthy elites for occult rituals.

Paranormal investigators who visit the crumbling site report disembodied weeping, sudden drops in temperature, and shadowy figures in the mansion’s old towers.

Now the site is ‘transitioning out of decay’, after developers plan to turn into a technology and office business park. Will a fresh start mean new life, or the return of old death? Only time will tell (keep an eye out for the Glassdoor reviews).

The Poltergeist of Calle Císter, Málaga Centro.

The famous pedestrian street in Malaga runs alongside the cathedral and is one of the few documented police cases of paranormal activity in Spain.

In June 1991, an office building on Calle Císter experienced violent disturbances. Employees reported heavy furniture moving on its own, glass shattering, and loud, unprompted banging.

The activity grew so intense that the National Police were called. According to official police logs, officers witnessed objects flying across the room and a heavy typewriter levitating off a desk. Where’s Jane Tennison when you need her?

The Phantom of the Alcazaba, Málaga Centro.

Security guards working night shifts at Málaga’s medieval Moorish fortress have long reported a shadowy figure slinking behind the corners of the ancient stone walls. The entity is often preceded by the sound of invisible stones hitting the ground and disembodied screams echoing through the courtyard ruins. Yikes!

A macabre side to Marbs

The Old Music Conservatory Ghost, Marbella Old Town.

Located within the narrow streets of the historic centre, this old structure has a reputation for strange activity. Passersby late at night have reported the faint sound of classical music drifting from the empty building, along with shifting shadows visible through the upper windows when no one’s inside….

Anyone else feeling a slight chill in the air?I’m off to find the rosé and return to the lighter side.

Until next time, happy holidays and stay ghosty!

Jo x

The heat is back and so are the ghosts.

Last week I took you on a terrifying plunge into midlife job hunting, which had culminated in me having a sob in front of a lovely group of women I didn’t know that well. Afterwards I had a bit of what my friend K calls a ‘vulnerability hangover’ (aka overshare syndrome) but the truth is, I did feel better for it.

I am really bad at crying. As is, I don’t do it enough and I never set time aside for a strategic sob, which others do and find very cathartic. And I am British. But as I've said before, we can carry a lot of accumulated shit in midlife and sometimes, it’s good to get it out. The healing power of grief dogs

One group of people who know how to cry are the teenage girls I sit opposite, coaching every week.

Teenage girls are really great criers. I should know, because I used to be one myself (the teenager from hell apparently, my dad wrote his diary at the time ‘Josephine is a barbarian,’ in reference to my table manners during a family holiday to Tenerife).

Over the years, I’ve seen young people come into a session with the weight of the world on their shoulders and more drama than a season finale of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.

Sometimes I think crikey, how am I going to sort this one out? But it’s not your job to fix. Just letting someone have a good cry, where no one is telling them not to cry/not be sad/silly, or count their blessings/put a positive spin on things, is just what’s needed.

We are designed to cry. It is one of our physiological functions, yet like many things, including sleep, we think we don’t really need it. So keep calm and cry, guys. That’s my wellbeing tip of the week. You are never too old to cry, and it doesn’t make you weak or unable to cope (and that goes for men as well).

The glasses case that moved by itself

Back to the ghosts. I have made you wait for part two of our trip to haunted York. I hope it’s worth it, but I can safely say that it was one of the smallest, biggest, most thrilling moments of my life and proof at last, that the afterlife DOES exist.

Not only that, but I was in the company of someone who Did Not Believe In Ghosts, who witnessed exactly the same thing I did. An experience like that changes you and your understanding of the world. You can either bury it or believe it. So read on and ask yourself – which camp will you fall into at the end?

For some reason, I am now channelling the voice of Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes in my head. In the manner of a crisp, analytical Victorian detective recounting one of his most intriguing cases, let us begin…

My trip to haunted York: part 2

Day two started well. Energised by a night of paranormal activities, including a ghost tour and a platter board in medieval banqueting hall, the Retired Fireman (RF) and I were full of vigour.

After a hearty breakfast of kippers, kedgeree and boiled mutton (we actually had flat whites and pastries) we stepped out, ready for our paranormal pub crawl frequenting various drinking establishments in the area.

First stop was the Ye Olde Starre Inn, which sits on one of medieval York’s central streets; a busy, bustling affair thronged with tourists and paranormal investigative journalists like myself.

The Ye Olde Starre Inn is a delightfully creaky, low-roofed establishment, which was used as a hospital and mortuary in the Civil War. According to Haunted Rooms, who bill themselves as ‘the UK’s No 1 haunted experience provider’, visitors and staff at Ye Olde Starre Inn have reported hearing the screams and groans of dying soldiers echoing up from the basement.

There was none of that as the RF and I entered the premises on a bustling Saturday afternoon. We sat down, cider for me and a pale ale for him. I took a few snaps which I sent to my psychic pal, who I’d dragged along remotely on our haunted weekend.

The night before, I’d sent her photos from the Golden Fleece pub, which allegedly houses up to 15 ghosts and where she’d picked up on some heavy spooky shit.

‘Weirdly, this one doesn’t feel as bad. It’s got much calmer energy,’ she messaged back. ‘There was a war for a start, so people knew what they’d signed up for. They knew they were in a hospital, so it was kind of expected and more peaceful.’

It would have been nice to stay for another and while away the time. But the RF runs on time and we were on a schedule. As a fiction author, I know all about building tension and saving the best for last. I should tell you about the other three pubs first, leading up to the Great Reveal.

But our paranormal incident actually happened next in pub two, at 1pm on a normal, pleasantly busy Saturday afternoon. Crucially, we were only one pint in, which meant we were in control of our senses. We were (still) sober, no tricks were played and to this day, no physical explanation has been given.

The strange incident at The Snickleway

From the name alone, I knew I was going to like The Snickleway. Housed in a Grade II-listed timber framed building on Goodramsgate, the pub is known for its cosy nooks, real ales and live music.

The Snickleway is also known for its ghosts, including the spirit of a former resident Mrs Tulliver, and her cat, Seamus, as well as a poltergeist in the cellar who interferes with the beer taps.

According to legend (Facebook), patrons have reported feeling phantom Seamus rub against the back of their legs whilst sat at the bar.

The Snickleway dates back to the 15^th century and is a place teeming with heritage and history. Much like the Golden Fleece the night before, there was a feeling of stepping off familiar land onto a ship of something. Unlike the heavy claustrophia of the previous evening, the Snickleway had a different, lighter vibe.

Put simply, there was a buzz in the air and it wasn't just the weekend punters.

Drinks in hand, the RF and I wandered down the winding corridor to find a room at the rear of the pub. A door led off to the toilets, while there was a small walled beer garden outside.

There were a couple of other customers there, who finished their drinks and left shortly after we arrived. The RF and I sat in the adjacent corner, at a table under a low roof. I messaged my pal to see what she thought.

So, in that one, the energy is in the corners, like they’re guarding the building, she replied. They've taken charge of it, as if it’s a fortress.

It’s steady though - nothing horrible - but they own it. They would push back if someone or something challenged them. There are either more than five, or the energy is split, because they’re nestled in every corner. The cat is perfectly happy. It doesn’t know it’s not alive anymore 😹

I sent her a message to say that coincidentally, we were sat in a corner. This time she sent a voicenote back.

‘When you told me that, I immediately got an image of a man smiling, like he was pleased that you were there. It’s not nasty in there at all, they’re [the ghosts] are just hanging out and guarding it, it’s just like their home.’

Bouyed by the feedback, I decided to do an experiment. ‘Let’s ask chappy to give us a sign he’s here!’

The RF looked unconvinced. His felt black glasses case was lying on the table in front of him. Picking it up, I placed it on the far corner of the table (see below)

‘Could you move this glasses case to the right,’ I asked the spirit, demonstrating thus, ‘To let us know you’re here.’ Like a proper paranormal investigate journalist, I also took photographic evidence.

Pic one: Before

I won’t say sceptism was oozing out of every pore, but the RF’s face had taken on a studiedly neutral expression. He was staying open-minded, he informed me.

To set the context, he and I were sat facing each other, on the pink sofa seat you can see in the photo. I was in the corner, with my right side to the table. The glasses case was on the far right side of the table. For either of us to move it, as I just had, you’d have to lean across each other to do so.

‘Let’s see what happens then,’ I said. Picking up our pints, we proceeded to engage in normal conversation, one of us hopeful, the other not so. I must admit, I wasn’t sure myself. Doubts crept in. Was I talking to thin air? Did ghosts perform to command, if there was such a thing after all? Was I going to be left with ecoplasm on my face?

Not two minutes later, I saw a long golden flash streak past me, at the same level as my arm. Like someone’s arm. I looked across the table, the glasses case had moved!!

Pic 2: After

‘Look at that!’ I crowed, ‘It’s actually bloody moved!’

We did the obligatory, ‘You must have moved it!’ to each other. We were sat a foot apart, arms virtually touching. If one of us had moved it, we would have had to lean across the table, in plain sight of the other one, to do so.

If neither of us had moved it, then who had? Rational scenarios were run through:

Was there something/someone under the table? No.

Had it been moved by a breeze? No breeze. We were sat in the corner of the pub.

Just to make my point, I blew heavily several times on the case and it didn’t move. Felt is heavier than you think.

I couldn’t actually believe my experiment had come true. I couldn’t believe a ghost had responded to my request. I wanted to make sure. Just in case our eyes were playing tricks on us. I put the case back in its original position.

‘Not that I’m asking you to be a performing seal,’ I said aloud again. ‘But could you do it again?’

Not two minutes later, it happened again! This time neither of us had noticed. ‘That is a bit freaky,’ the RF conceded.

It was hard to contain my excitement. Even though I’m a believer, I still couldn’t quite believe it myself. I didn’t feel freaked out, or anything like that. There was just good cheer, some playful banter from down the centuries.

I set the glasses case back again, just in case. ‘It won’t happen a third time,’ I said, and I meant it. It had happened twice, as far as I was concerned, my experiment was done and I was happy.

We went back to chatting about other things, almost putting this fantastical, otherworldly experience behind us. Because what words do you have for something that shouldn’t happen, but just did?

Some while later, we finished our drinks. ‘Shall we?’ the RF said. I nodded. ‘Onto the next one.’

Gathering our things, we both noticed it at the same time. Somehow, under our very noses, the glasses case had moved again, this time the most obviously out of the three.

Pic 3

‘I don’t like this.’ The RF grabbed the case off the table. His face changed. ‘It feels really cold. Look.’

I held it. It was noticeably cooler, like it had been left in the fridge.

‘O.M.G,’ I breathed. ‘OMG!’

Taking our leave, we departed, but not before I had one last, wonderous look round that funny, quaint little room. For me, proof at last, there are things beyond this physical world. In the paraphrased words of the Uncanny theme tune, I know what we saw.

Look at the pictures and make your own mind up: bury or believe it? Personally, I found it all rather magical. If we have ghosts, then why not angels, guides and all manner of unseen other things? (and the bad ones, but let’s not kill the vibe.)

‘Thank you,’ I said to the ghost. ‘You have made my day!’

In my head, I could hear him chuckling.

Until next time, stay ghosty.

Jo x

York in five spooky pubs

The Golden Fleece

Old school heavy haunting, most likely to see a ghost. Worth a trip for the ghoulish memrobilia alone.

Top pick: The Snickleway

Phantom fun central. Go and ask for your own glasses case to be moved

Guy Fawkes Inn

Reportedly built on the birthplace of the Gunpowder conspirator. Shadowy apparitions and phantom children.

Ye Olde Starre Inn

The ER of its day. I can’t promise a hot dead George Clooney but you’ll get good vibes and a nice pint.

The Black Swan

Home to a pair of disembodied legs and bucketloads of charm, the staff have their fair share of ghost stories too

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There’s been a turn in the hot weather: things have turned dark, dank and a bit gloomy.

Perfect conditions to tell you about my visit to the enchanting and heavily haunted city of York. For all my hopeful hype, was I really expecting to have a supernatural experience? Probably not. But when you visit somewhere with such a high head(less) count, one shouldn’t really be surprised when it serves something up…

So sit down, settle in, and enjoy the ride, which started on the 10.11 train from Stevenage some Fridays ago.

I was born in York, where at the time my parents were stationed at a nearby RAF base. We moved down south shortly afterwards and I have little recollection of York, nor have been back since, save one family trip as an uninterested teenager.

I was born into York and despite my indifference, York remembered me. When I stepped off the train nearly two hours later, it instantly felt like I was stepping into something familiar. Welcome back Jo, it seemed to say. We’ve been expecting you.

Life – and death – has existed on the site of York for nearly 2,000 years. The city walls extend round the city for nearly two miles, making them the longest medieval town walls in Europe. York itself spreads far beyond the city walls, but it was in the compact, cobbled centre where the Retired Fireman and I were to spend our weekend.

I don’t think I’ve ever been somewhere as alive as York. And I don’t just mean by those of us who are breathing. Atmosphere lurks at every corner. The stones tell a thousand stories. The Shambles is York’s most famous medieval street: a narrow, twisting labyrinth where old beamed houses huddle together, their roofs almost touching as if whispering about those of us who wander below.

The Shambles comes from an old English word meaning slaughterhouses or butchers stalls. Many of the shops still have the low, wide window ledges where the meat was once displayed, but instead of carcasses, obscenely sized cakes and other sweet treats now tempt those looking to satisfy cravings or fill their bellies.

Alongside the bakeries, pubs and that enduring cockroach of retail, the Edinburgh Woollen Mill, York is full of ghost-themed shops, some styled up as supernatural apothecaries. Long lines of people snake down the street waiting for a door person to let them in on a ‘one in, one out’ basis, like some sort of mad otherworldly 90s nightclub.

The spell didn’t work on the Retired Fireman however. ‘Queue for this? Fuck no,’ he declared loudly outside The York Ghost Merchants, while stood directly next to said queue of people.

Before any more small children’s faces fell (actually, they were more Gen Z) I whisked him off and we spent the rest of the day doing the highlights. Visiting soaring York Minster, aimless walking and history goggling, doing a recce for the establishments we’d be visiting next day on our paranormal pub crawl. All this was leading up to the evening highlight, a ghost tour the Retired Fireman had booked as part of my birthday present. The man knows his way to my haunted heart.

When dusk falls

Evening came and it was time for us to leave our lovely little AirBnB, set in a converted stable block off one of York’s foodie streets. The ghost tour was due to start at 7pm, so we visited the enticingly named House of Trembling Madness, a medieval beer hall, for some local ale to kick things off. A packed, high-beamed room on the first floor, a sign on the wall proclaimed that seances were regularly held here. Woo!

We got chatting to a twentysomething guy on the table next to us, waiting for his two mates to turn up. Explaining we were off on a ghostbusting weekend, I revealed to him I was, in fact, a paranormal investigative journalist and a ghost-fluencer. ‘GHOST-FLUENCER’ I repeated, just for effect. He didn’t look as impressed as I’d have hoped.

He did agree however, we were in the right place. ‘You can’t throw a stone here [York] without hitting a haunted pub.’

Our appetite whetted, we went off to find our ghost tour, one of several that run in the city. About forty people were already there, gathered round a man with Edward Scissorhands hair and lashings of black eyeliner. The Retired Fireman muttered something about too many numbers. Ominously, I could see him contemplating the Trustpilot but then we were off.

For the next hour we went on a whistlestop tour of spooky York: from a haunted antiques centre where a child fell to her death from the top floor landing, to a boarded up plague house where a young girl was left and is apparently seen staring mournfully through an upstairs window, to a 1970s street that was once the site of a children’s home where the young inhabitants met an unfortunate death and ever since, their tormented spirits are alleged to have subjected unsuspecting passersby to invisible pushes and kicks.

As I write that, I realise it was all quite kid-heavy. The little-uns always get it in ghost stories, don’t they? Our guide had already told us early on that he was an actor, and you could feel his frustration that he was made for better things. About two thirds of the way through I could see the RF’s attention was started to wane and he was looking longingly in the windows of every pub we passed.

Even I was getting a bit itchy by then, so when we found ourselves across the road a tall, narrow slither of a building reputed to be York’s most haunted pub, the ghost tour stood no chance. Exchanging a silent nod, we slipped quietly away from the rest of the group and found ourselves standing outside the crooked doorway of the Golden Fleece.

A drinking establishment since the early 15^th century, the pub is said to be haunted by a whopping 15 spirits (not of the Jim Beam variety), including Lady Alice Beckett, wife of a former mayor of York who is said to wander the corridors and staircases, a one-eyed highwayman, a Victorian child (them again!) and a Canadian airman who fell from a window in 1945 and is reportedly seen in one of the guest rooms.

On first glance, things looked promising. A nice young man was on the door outside (again I’m not quite sure why, is it to keep stag parties out or ghosts in?). I asked him if he’d seen anything. ‘I haven’t, but I’ve heard things,’ he said. ‘What things?’ ‘Weird things.’ He didn’t elaborate. The ale pumps were beckoning, so I decided to come back later.

Terror tail up now, we entered the Golden Fleece. And my, what a bucket of atmosphere to walk into! It wasn’t just that it was so old; with all the dark wood, wonky floors and macabre memorabilia (chained doll in a glass case anyone?). There was that soup of something that you could feel as soon as you walked in.

First off, the proportions of the place. Tall and narrow, it was like stepping off dry land onto a galleon ship. Then there was the vibe. You know when you enter a room where there’s just been an argument and no one says anything, but you can just tell? It felt exactly like that: walking into a space a hundred people had recently exited: leaving behind their tension, emotions, energy and everything else.

The feeling of slight sea sickness continued, and it wasn’t just down to the uneven floors and winding corridors. The RF and I bought a pint and found a table. I messaged my psychic friend and sent her a few pics. Major spooky vibes here. What do you think?

The reply didn’t take long.

That place is teeming with very thick, very old stuck energy [the soup!] It’s like one giant orb.’ Interestingly, she picked up on a forcefield encasing the pub, which was acting like a spooky snow globe. ‘There’s a glass dome structure over the outside of it, so all the ancient energy is trapped in there. There’s dark energy there, because lots of people died there who didn’t expect to. Lots of violence and murder action!’

The pub was a warren, stretching back into a bar at the back of the building, as well as two floors above of more wonky, low-ceilinged rooms. Upstairs the place was atmospheric to the point of oppressive. The Golden Fleece also has four guest rooms - while I was perfectly happy to sup a pint there in a room full of other people, you couldn’t pay me to stay there. The whole place screamed Ghost Central. I had more questions. The person behind the bar was busy serving customers, so I went to find another staff member to talk to.

By now there were two different young people on the door. ‘So, have you guys ever seen a ghost here?’ I asked. ‘We haven’t, but we’re heard things.’ That line again. ‘What kind of things?’ ‘Put it this way, you wouldn’t want to be here alone after dark when you’re closing up,’ the taller one said. ‘Guests have left in the middle of the night for no reason,’ the other one told me. Did he know why? A shrug. ‘Don’t know. Just that they didn’t like it.’

So. Many. Questions. So many unanswered answers. I weep for the disinterest of today’s youth. I did Google ‘Was anyone murdered at the Golden Fleece in York?’ and this is what it came up with.

While the historic Golden Fleece in York is widely famous as one of the most haunted pubs in England, there are no documented records of anyone actually being murdered inside the building. The building’s dark reputation stems from several tragic, accidental, or self-inflicted deaths associated with it over the centuries including: The Landlord: A former landlord reportedly took his own life behind the bar.

But perhaps most interestingly:

Additionally, the pub’s basement was used as a temporary morgue during World War II. Centuries prior, bodies of executed criminals from the nearby York Tyburn were temporarily stored in the cellar to wait for their families.

That would account for the tense, dense feel of the place. We finished our pints. ‘Want another one?’ I asked the RF. ‘No, I think I’ve had enough.’ The Fleece had been fun, but I know what he meant. As we stepped back into the fresh night air, I had the unmistakable feeling of shaking something off and leaving it behind.

One paranormal pub down, half a dozen to go. Little did we know what was in store for us the next day. All I will say is that you’ll never look at your glasses case in the same way again…

Until then, keep dancing stay ghosty!

Jo x

COMING NEXT TIME:

Touched by the dead! And not in that way.

Acts of vandalism. That’s the phrase that springs to mind. When you’re going out with someone and spend a lot of time at theirs, you unintentionally - and intentionally - commit acts of vandalism against their home environment.

Currently I am living ‘bi-county’ - based out of my dad’s in Bedfordshire but spending a few days a week in Hertfordshire at the home of the man in my life, the retired fireman [insert your hose joke here]

The Retired Fireman (RF) has generously welcomed me into his abode, and I have repaid that by smashing through his well-ordered systems with the grace of a medieval wrecking ball.

Like your mind, you take your domestic habits with you. Entrenched in mine, I have been merrily going about my own ways at his, committing a thousand tiny, heart-rending violations on a hourly basis. I have accidentally deprogrammed news channels, broken kitchen equipment and walked out, leaving front doors wide open in my wake (blame the brain fog).

The coat rack has suffered a full territory invasion from my Uniqlo banana bags. I leave car keys lying around, flouting the strict ‘hang up as soon as you get in, so you don’t lose them rule’ and then ask if he’s seen my car keys. My bikini waxing strips have been lying on his dining room table for weeks (unused, I hasten to add).

The list could go on, but as far as I can see there are three perennial things cohabiting couples fall out over.

The dishwasher

The biggie. The RF’s dishwasher is stacked with the precision of a North Korean military display, mine looks like someone has inhaled the insides of a B&M store and promptly thrown it back up again. My breezy: ‘It all gets washed’ apparently doesn’t cut it, especially when he finds more spinach stuck to another serving spoon and has to put another cycle on again.

Sharing a bed/sleep

To my horror, I have become a snorer in midlife. I know this to be true, because I have been presented with the audio evidence. As silent as the grave in slumber himself, the RF was well-rested until he met me, poor man. Now, you’ve seen less knackered-looking new parents first thing.

I don’t mean to diss my fellow bedroom brayers but honestly, becoming a snorer is one of the most uncool, unsexy things that has ever happened to me. It's like getting hammered on white wine the night before: you wake up in the morning with no recollection of what you’ve done but the knowing it’s really bad.

I spent most of my twenties and thirties waking up after a pub Chardonnay binge, contracting in horror at what I thought I’d said or done. I’d believed those days were over thank god, but now I have the same feelings of guilt and trepidation as I roll over in the mornings, to be confronted by the damage inflicted the previous night.

I also get night terrors, where apparently I sound like a demonic crow, and do weird things like climb over people while fully asleep, to check the alarm clock. It’s fun sharing a bed with me. Apparently snoring can be a perimenopausal system, and we all know how midlife hormones can ravage your sleep so again, I’ll be blaming it on that.

Lastly and not so obvious, we have TV algorithms

We have an intimate relationship with our own algorithm. We put proper work and craft into them. They’re what makes us us. Carefully honed from hours of tireless watching, they’re the modern day blueprint for who we are, what we like, what we do. Our TV algorithms are where we escape to, zone out in, live vicariously through others and, have that rare midlife excitement of actually having something to look forward to!

Our algorithms are our identity, curated by us for us, so imagine how it feels when someone comes in and sets about dismantling that identity, one bad TV choice at a time.

When we first met, the RF’s Netflix algorithm was full of wildlife shows, mountain expeditions, war documentaries and any movie starring Denzil Washington. Now the cuckoo has flown into the TV nest and the man doesn’t even know his own algorithm anymore. And let me tell you, that’s a lonely place to be.

One day I found him sitting forlornly on his own sofa, a ghost of his former TV watching self. ‘Look at this,’ he said, waving his own remote control hopelessly at his own TV screen. ‘It’s full of shows about ghosts, serial killers and ghosts who have become serial killers.’

‘So what?’ I said, somewhat facetiously. ‘You’re saying that like it’s a bad thing.

Secretly though, it did make me think. Was I a bit too much into the macabre? Was it normal to be into things so abnormal? Despite being a pretty upbeat person, I have always been drawn to the darkness. What kind of affect can all this dark content have on your psyche?

I did come across a recent article about the rise of exorcisms post Covid, after people binged on too much bad shit and went down some dark web wormholes. So that’s something worth bearing in mind the next time I attempt to watch The Devil on Trial yet again. Sometimes, the beast is best left un-poked (or unwatched).

You’ve been ghosted

Despite my fears, I was soon to be vindicated. I have recently returned from a brilliant weekend in the heavily haunted city of York, an inspired birthday present from the RF.

We had the most spook-tastic time, including a ghost tour and a GENUINE ghost experience on a paranormal pub crawl, involving the RF’s glasses case, which left him, a sceptic, genuinely unsettled and me, genuinely thrilled that for the second time, it would appear I can communicate with the dead. (You can read all about my encounter with The Teenage Victorian Ghost here She's behind you

I have been regaling anyone who will listen with my tales of terror. One person asked for the list of haunted pubs. I was pleasantly surprised; he hadn’t struck me as the ghost-centric type.

‘It’s good to know for the dating apps,’ he continued. ‘Nowadays all the profiles say they’re into crime shows and the supernatural.’

‘Is it a thing?’ I asked.

He nodded. ‘It’s a total thing.’

You heard it here first guys: ghosting is over. The Millennial singles of Britain (and a snoring midlife woman from somewhere near Stevenage) are into the real deal. It’s the elusive question that has stalked men for millennia: are ghosts the way to a girl’s heart?

Midlife magnificence

Before I leave you, I’d like to point you in the direction of another Substacker on here, Leanna Bishop. I’m not sure how I found Leanna, but she writes brilliantly and is so on-the-money about where she feels in midlife right now, against the backdrop of an empowerment industry that tells you to go live your best life, regardless of what that life actually holds. I have written about this subject myself, but Leanna is much more eloquent and has articulated what I have been struggling to put into words myself for a while.

You can read her last essay here Midlife, Money Wounds, and Becoming Increasingly Allergic to Bullshit and the one before it is a corker as well

Coming next time:

Part one of my haunted trip up North. Prepare to be titillated and terrified I take on the ghosts of York and more!

Until next time stay ghostly and remember, protect your algorithm at all costs.

Love Jo x

The ghosts always give you what you want.

I was a bit short on AYOG inspo this week, and I was also off to the Cambridge Botanical Gardens. Ooh, I thought. There could be a link here!

So I voice-noted my aunt Pam’s gardener, who I love, and asked him if he’d ever come across a haunted garden.

‘Er no!’ he replied, adding a ghost emoji. ‘But I don’t see why not’, along with a link to an article about haunted gardens.

I could quote from the Gardens Illustrated piece but to be honest, I wouldn’t be doing it justice, so here it is Spooky gardens I’d love to share a cream tea with featured Cornwall land mogul Sir Tim Smit, who sounds like a cross between Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen and the team behind Horrible Histories.

“From the early days at The Lost Gardens of Heligan there have been stories and experiences of ghosts, essences, forces, elementals, a poltergeist, many transparent presences and some things to which one would shudder to give a name,” says co-founder Sir Tim.

Good, isn’t he? What follows are ghoulish tales of Crystal Grottos, Flower Gardens, Melon Yards and a terrifying incident in the Potting Shed. All I will say is, you’ll never look at your salad potatoes this summer in the same way again.

Places don’t scare people, things do

Spring is singing once again in the British landscape. The countryside is gorgeously engorged with all manner of shape and colour again, with our buoyant hedgerows rivalling Donald Trump’s own bouffant.

Yet as we now know, amongst all this renewed life, death can lurk. We are attached to places that hold the most meaning and memories. If a house can be haunted, why not its garden?

Much the same, objects can apparently also be haunted. Years ago I went on a West End ghost tour in London, which told the story of a cursed jacket that had been worn by an unfortunate murdered actress. Successors who wore the jacket on stage reported feelings of strangulation and not being able to breathe.

[Spooky spoiler alert!]

Meanwhile, there is the infamous story of the cursed Annabelle doll, a red-haired raggedy doll from the 1970s, claimed by paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren (real life inspo for The Conjuring series) to be demonically possessed and capable of something called ‘psychic slashes.’ Which I assume, is nothing to do with 10.30pm on a Wetherspoons pub crawl.

Apparently Annabelle is so dangerous she’s locked away in a museum somewhere in the US, and even has her own handler. This is Hollywood, after all. I’m going to stop writing about her because she freaks me out, but you can read more here in The Guardian (!) Demonic dolls

Back to where we started, the Botanical Gardens. On the train to Cambridge, I decided to while away the time having a gentle Google. Can plants be possessed? I asked Apparently so, according to Reddit, my favourite online mad pit.

I will leave you with a photo of me hugging a seriously sexy Sierra Redwood.

This has largely been a light-hearted version of AYOG, but with all the things going on in the world at the moment, I think sometimes a silly inconsequential dance around the worlds of plants and the paranormal can be the medicine we need.

On that note, stay ghosty, hug a tree and I’m off myself to dance around a maypole!

Jo x

I’m coming in live from a corner of Gail’s, in the picturesque and heavily haunted town of Hitchin.

The eagle-eyed amongst you (ok, one person) may have noticed I didn’t post last week. Missing a deadline that only you have set that no one really cares about is like buying the cheapest seat on an easyJet flight out of Luton, and then driving to sit in the carpark to watch it take off without you.

In other news, mildly thrilling. And slightly subversive - I gave up shoplifting in my teens and at this point in life, you have to take your kicks where you can.

I also suffer from a lot of self pressure, and letting myself off the hook about something that isn’t compulsory and should only be done for joy, is actually quite liberating.

Fright night

I have to say though, I did miss the ghosts. Last week I had a very enjoyable trip to the theatre with my good friends N and R, to see the stage production of Paranormal Activity, which is billed as one of the most terrifying shows in London.

You know when you say yes to something at the time and then regret it? R was in that camp. We met at the train station, where he told me he’d signed up thinking it was along Stranger Things/Twilight Zone vibes, rather than full-on bowel-emptying demonic possession.

‘Of all the nice things in London and we’re going to see this,’ he said mournfully, staring down the tracks towards our capital, as if something dreadful was coming.

In a way it was. But a good kind of dread, in N’s and my books anyway. The show was at the Ambassador Theatre, a dinky atmospheric Victorian theatre tucked down a side street off Tottenham Court Road.

The build up wasn’t promising. Even a prawn sandwich from M&S did not lift R’s mood. He’d tried to leave once already, nobly offering to pick us both up from the station afterwards instead. Kind offer as it was, I was onto him. I am a paranormal investigative journalist. This was not on-brand. We were going in with our AYOG game faces on, whether he liked it or not.

At first glance, it was a lot. The outside of the theatre was festooned in terror-inducing reviews. ‘Proper frightening - arm-clutchingly, stranger-embracingly so,’ said The Metro. Hold your nerve boomed an instruction over the entrance door. People were looking a bit unnerved, and they were just the ticket checkers.

I was genuinely starting to feel bad for R. Especially as once inside, he ended up sitting in an aisle seat near the front (any of you who have gone to see The Woman in Black at the deliciously spooky Fortune Theatre in Soho will know what I mean).

The place was packed, a frisson of nervous anticipation in the air. I glanced sideways at R. I’ve seen less condemned-looking men about to step off the plank.

Suddenly we were plunged into pitch black! The kind of darkness where you can’t see your hand in front of your face. Someone screamed. It might have been R. One of Nirvana’s song filled the theatre, the name of which brain fog has currently stolen from me, and we were off.

I won’t go into detail and give away any plot spoilers but at half time, I turned to look at R. Firstly, I was pleasantly surprised to see he was still there and not on the 2121 Cambridge train home. Secondly he was looking, dare I say it, quite chipper. ‘It’s alright,’ we managed to get out of him. Then: ‘Does anyone want an ice cream?’

Clutching our pots of raspberry ripple, we sat back for the second half. It was just as good as the first: a claustrophobic cast of two main characters (husband and wife) along with two supporting actors. And an unseen presence…. If anyone does has been to see it and knows how they pulled off the kitchen sink scene, please let me know. N and I have our theories (look out for the length of the dressing gown), but it produced genuine screams and ‘Nooooos!’ from the audience.

As the curtain went down for the final time, R no longer looked like a man who’d had to endure the worst night of his life at the behest of his wife and her friend. He actually had a glow: eyes wide and face taut, rosy-flushed cheeks. ‘Look at you, brought to life by the dead,’ I marvelled. AYOG beauty tip: it would appear that sheer terror is as good for your complexion as shoving your face in a sink filled with ice cubes and cold water.

I did do a welfare check the next day and apparently: ‘Sunlight is a great antiseptic’, so I might be bringing R along to my next paranormal investigation. I think he’s got the chops for it and glowing they are now, too.

N and I also had a buzz and laughed the whole way home. Lost in an age of Netflix sludge, you can forget how great putting a proper bra on and going out for a night of immersive storytelling can be. On the rare occasion I do go to the theatre, I always say I should go more. Hold me to this: if anyone else knows any other supernatural shows I should go and see, please send ‘em mine (and R’s) way.

Haunted by your head

The sell for Paranormal Activity’s is very compelling: ‘Places aren’t haunted, people are’. In the show’s case, it meant it quite literally. But we can be haunted by many things. In the last AYOG, I pondered writing a newsletter that appealed to both people who love ghosts and those who are terrified of them/don’t believe in them.

‘It’s not just the dead who haunt us,’ a friend messaged me afterwards. ‘We are haunted by the past too.’

She makes a very good point. Bad decisions, things we said or didn’t day, white wine shame… the list goes on. If you are like me, you can be haunted by your mind, which was the premise of my unpublished comedy spiritual bestseller, Claire Jenkins Versus the Devil. Our minds will conjure up any old shit/bad juju to torment us, as I experienced.

Recently I experienced an attack of full body hives, which I hope is the first and last time it will ever happen to me. For a week I was up in the night scratching but by the end, it was no longer the rash that had sent me mad with misery, but my 3am hive mind.

Like a misfiring malevolence hose, it relentlessly sprayed me with all sorts of buried horror juice. Regrettable drunken incidents from two decades ago, an act of lazy selfishness in Australia in 2016, cringe things I said in a recent job chat, conversations I imagined happened twenty five years ago…

On and on it went, until I was curled up in a ball of my own mental misery, vowing to write letters of apology to everyone I’d ever wronged, a bit like they apparently do in AA. Thankfully the hives have gone and I’m sleeping through the night again, as much as a recovering insomniac and midlife woman with burning hot thighs can, but it has left its mark. Am I really more afraid of ghosts, or what my own mind can conjure up? If anyone else gets waterboarded by their own thoughts in the small hours, please let me know. I would welcome the solidarity.

Back to being haunted by things in the past: my friend Polly made a similar point recently. Polly is a brilliant columnist training to be a brilliant therapist and she wrote about the two careers colliding in her Substack Shrinkwrapped. It’s a great read following Polly’s therapy journey and she is basically going to be the next Phillippa Perry, so you can read all about it here Shrinkwrapped

On that note, stay ghosty and see you next time!

Jo x

Feedback is always good and none more than when you’re a writer.

I met up with a pal last week, who told me that some aspects of AYOG gave her the shivers, and not necessarily in a pleasant way. While some of my readers are genuine fans of the supernatural, some are lovely friends who signed up to support me, for whom ghosts aren’t their haunted hat bag, or who lean more towards the esoteric and spiritual.

As A Year of Ghosts has developed, I said it was not just a newsletter about death and all that surrounds it, but one about life as well. However, there is a point where you can start to resemble the content version of an aerodrome car boot sale. So from now on, I’m going to do all the non scary/funny stuff at the start, with an option to plunge into the ENTER IF YOU DARE, THE TERROR STARTS HERE type section afterwards.

Which hopefully means no one starts the newsletter laughing and leaves crying, because no discerning Substacker wants their audience feeling like that.

The paranormal pen

After a decade of not really writing, I have realised I need to write. Non negotiable. At primary school I was the school storyteller - see me below reading out my first spooky story about two ghosts called Batty and Boo.

There is also, I’ve just realised, a piglet in it called Pam. Which is rather lovely, as I’m down at my deceased aunt Pam’s bungalow for the weekend. I really felt her absence again when I first walked in, so this feels like a little hi from her. Hi P!

As a young teenager, my fortnightly highlight was more! magazine being delivered through the letterbox. I knew I wanted to be a magazine journalist and I did end working for more! I wrote in and asked for work experience, made the tea and did the photocopying for a year and basically refused to leave until a job came up.

Life was so much simpler back then, and I was much more sure of myself. They say youth is wasted on the young. The same goes for self belief that hasn’t yet had the edges knocked off.

more! was followed by a stint at UK GLAMOUR (sorry if this is turning into my LinkedIn page) and then the heady days at heat magazine, when showbiz was epic and I made some of my most brilliant mates. A book deal later, I left to become a full time bonkbuster author for a number of years.

So as you can see, I was born to write.

While I’ve been off for the last decade on my own journey, and have worked on some interesting projects and enjoyable ghostwriting gigs (writing for others versus channelling the spirits), I realised that along the way, I lost my own identity as a writer. So this is what AYOG is. A little paranormal-themed love letter to myself. Keeping the creative pipes open, so to speak.

My industry has been decimated over the past fifteen years, but instead of bemoaning it, maybe I should count myself lucky I had a job I genuinely loved, for a decent amount of time. What is certain is that I still need to write, whether I get paid or not.

Last week I talked about Pam being in relationship with her garden. It’s the same when you write. You show up on the good days and the bad. When I worked for heat, my articles probably got read by over a million people a week. Now it’s you sixty odd good subscribers. As I have said, we are a small band but we are mighty. This is not me feeling sorry for myself, or looking back to the glory days. When you’re meant to write you do it anyway, regardless of what happens on the other side.

AYOG is a bit of an experiment in finding my voice again, so I thank you for coming along on the journey with me.

Headless headlines

That took us on a bit of a detour. But while we’re on the subject: as a journalist/editor, you know your strengths and weaknesses.

One of the things I have always been shit at is writing headlines. Rottweiler interviewer who savages unsuspecting celebs, no problem.

Want me to put Vernon Kaye on the spot asking if it’s true he bought Tess Daly a new pair of boobs for Christmas? Bryan McFadden if he shagged behind bride-to-be Kerry Katona’s back on his stag do? Simon Cowell when he last had sex? (“I’m not telling you that, Jo”). No problem. Ask me to write a half decent headline or caption? Honestly, save yourself the bother. You’d be better off asking the dog.

With no witty subs desk on hand, I am left to my own devices. I had a long car journey yesterday, so was looking for some paranormal podcast inspo. I had a look at Paranormal Activity with Yvette Fielding I am have to say, it was quite taken with the some of the titles. Once you work in showbiz, you always work in showbiz.

MURDERS THAT HAUNT: The Case of Ethel Major – The Corned Beef Killer

In a nutshell: Ghostly footsteps at Hull Prison

MONDAY MAILTIME: Chanting That Wasn’t Meant for Us & The Thing That Walked Behind Her

Prehistoric energy tied to places

YVETTE AND KARL INVESTIGATE: Homes Built on the Dead – Battlefields, Barracks & Burial Grounds

If you live on a Barratt’s housing estate, you’re f*cked.

And my favourite one: YVETTE INVESTIGATES: The World's Most Haunted Trees At risk of spoiler alerts, I’d give the New Forest a wide berth from now on.

(You can read about my run in with YF when I was a paranormal celebrity journalist here Week 3: When the past comes back to haunt you)

It takes a tribe to raise a newsletter, so if there are any aspiring headline writers out there, please send your services my way.

It’s been a relatively terror-free edition of AYOG, so I hope it still ticks the boxes for the more hardcore ghosties. Take a look, it might be behind you!

On that note, happy Sunday and see you next time.

Jo x

Is it me, or does anyone else feel like their chat stinks of late? As in, having nothing interesting to say. Fifty has been a quiet year for me so far and I’ve been quite happy saying that I'm happily boring, but now I wonder if I’ve just become… boring.

Boring creeps up on you, like a stealth bomber tracking its target. Twice this week, I have found myself telling the same person about my optician’s appointment for multi-focal contact lenses, with the kind of excitement reserved for riding a 1000-foot-drop zip wire.

‘They send you off for a thirty minute walk around town to road test them! Apparently they take some getting used to!’

I watched said other person’s eyes glaze over. ‘I know,’ they said kindly, calmly. ‘You have told me already.’

It hit me like a hammer blow. You have told me already. That dreaded phase reserved for people you don’t want to listen to/your ageing parents.

There was a point in my early forties where I realised I had become accidentally lonely, and I think the same has happened here.

I have solo-travelled halfway around the world, squared up to Justin Timberlake’s massive bouncer at the Chateau Marmont in LA and once, got chased by a stampeding buffalo whilst on the back of a moped.

I am better than this.

I’m putting it down to a case of midlife-itus, where everything feels a bit ‘meh’ and you’ve lost your oomph.

I could also have become that person who everyone avoids sitting next to at dinner parties; who drones on about their aching wrists and the ‘multi focal v bi focal’ prescription debate.

Can anyone else relate to having midlife-itus? I would be interested to hear. I was quite happy being happily boring. If anyone has any idea how to get back there, please let me know.

Routine phantoms

Thank god for the ghosts. But they’re allowed to be boring, too. Ghosts are always stereotyped as scary, evil or sad, but if you were dull in this life, are you dull in the next life?

I jest, but there is some validity in what I’m saying. As renowned psychic medium Julie Cryer (and recent of Daily Mail fame) told us here, personalities can be carried through into the afterlife. So if you were born without a sense of humour, you can be dead without one too.

Perked up by the boring theme, I googled ‘Can ghosts be boring’ and to my surprise, quite a lot popped up. Snore-worthy spirits it would seem, are a thing.

First off was the AI overview (sorry!) which did tickle me a bit.

Boring ghost encounters are underwhelming, routine, or easily dismissed paranormal events, often involving minor sensory glitches, brief sightings, or repetitive, harmless actions

Common “Boring” Ghost Encounters

• The Routine Phantom: A ghost that follows a strict, predictable schedule, such as an entity buzzing a sauna timer, similar to a friendly, elderly gentleman who would buzz to say bye daily at 10:55 PM.

• The Passerby: Simply seeing a “faint figure” or “dark outline” of a person who vanishes upon turning on the lights, frequently mistaken for a real family member.

• Minor Auditory Phenomena:Hearing faint, unexplained knocking, creaking, or muffled conversations, which are often quickly dismissed.

• The Office Specter: A figure seen walking through a carriage or office, described as “underwhelming” and almost bureaucratic.

There’s also a YouTube episode called Elephant and Castle’s boring Ghost Encounter, featuring quotes from an unimpressed Tube driver. Even academics are into the theme. Caron Lipman’s 2014 book Co-habiting with Ghosts: Knowledge, Experience and Belief and the Domestic Uncanny is an exploration of mundane living with ghosts.

On the other end of the cultural scale, we have the one star reviews on Trip Advisor. A ‘Ghosts of Gettyburg’ tour was “lame” and “boring”, huffed one person, saying: “the most we learned about people sometimes smelling stuff.” I don’t know about you but I feel a new Mackenzie Crook sitcom coming on. Ghost Tours: insert tagline here.

As you know, I sit between fear and fascination on the whole supernatural thing. I have to say I might have found my niche: boring ghosts. Give me a conscientious entity who routinely buzzes a sauna timer over a demonic force every day. In this current world of chaos, maybe boring and predictable is just what we need.

A bittersweet Spring

This is the first Easter I won’t get a card from my aunt Pam, who died at the end of January, aged 93. Every year for as long as I can remember, I have received a bright, nature-themed card, in her famously perfunctory style: Jo/insert appropriate greeting/ Pam.

I never really thought much about those little cards turning up, but I’ve been surprised by the size of the hole left. I’d love to get one more with an illustrated duckling or rabbit on the front, and seeing her neat handwriting inside: Jo. Happy Easter. Pam. It’s funny how you will miss two words so much.

Pam won’t get to see one last Spring and her beautiful garden bursting back into life, aided by the bag of mulch she ordered shortly before her death.

I have been thinking about her a lot this week. Pam loved this time of year and embarking on another season with her garden. She was in constant relationship with her garden: planted it, grew it, studied it, ate from it. Indeed, I still feel her essence all around me. Not just in her own Eden that she created, complete with bird community who still congregate outside her back door, but in nature everywhere: the fields, flowers and hedgerows coming back to life.

Maybe we look for things to fill a physical absence, but I do believe we go back to something bigger and more organic. Pam is in a different season now, beyond the five senses. I hope she’s still taking pleasure in her little patch doing so well.

With that, I shall sign off this week’s AYOG in tribute to my awesome aunt.

Pam. Happy Easter. Jo

Happy Easter to you all too.

Jo x

Guys, I’m trending. After talking about haunted homes in last week’s AYOG, I came across one in this month’s Country Living magazine. The at-home feature was about a converted old pub in a Sussex village (unnamed, so I can’t go down there with my night vision goggles, although there’s a fine line between a paranormal journalist and a Peeping Tom).

Locals refer to the place as “the ghost house”, explained new owners Tom and Anne-Marie, adding: “Which we didn’t want to investigate too deeply. If there are ghosts, they're very friendly ones!”

Disappointingly, there was no more mention of the ghosts, but I had to remind myself this was an interior design feature. The couple, both basket weavers - obviously - came across as resolutely cheerful and can-do. The renovation is gorgeous as you can see below, and filled with light, colour and plants.

It made me think of last week’s theory posed in AYOG: do some houses have an innate ‘intelligence’ and connect with the energy of particular inhabitants? Or not in the Country Living case - have this upbeat pair managed to kill/neutralise any potential ghost vibes?

Or it could be, that despite being knocked about a bit, the place approves of what they’ve done and has piped down. If I was a resident spirit, I would totally be down with the rustic vibe and those yellow kitchen units. As ever, you decide…

When homes turn bad

You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned Foxhill yet, the family home of forty years where I experienced strange happenings. I sit writing this in my dad’s current new build, a mere mile or so down the road. Last time, I promised you the story of Foxhill. This week, I’ve been finding every reason not to do it. Maybe because it’s a long story and I’ve been feeling a bit tired. Or maybe it’s simpler than that. When you move on, like many things, some doors are better left closed.

Or maybe - stay with me - it’s something to do with Foxhill itself and the way the house wants the story to be told. Because sometimes, the best ghost stories don’t start at the beginning. They start at the end…

Don’t leave

I rarely drive past the lane leading down to Foxhill now. Once or twice, I have made a quick detour down there to look, like a game of dare, heart pounding more than it should be. I’ve told myself it’s because it’s a dead end and I don’t want to draw attention to myself. What I actually don’t want is for the new owners to come out, ask who I am and end up inviting me in.

The house has had extensive renovations and is both familiar and completely alien to me. I have circled it cautiously, like a tiger in a cage - i.e not something you want to get too close to. I have good reason. Despite all my happy years and memories there, my parting from Foxhill was not a good one. In fact, it was more of a bad break up.

When you move, seeing the place you once called home bare and stripped of its contents, is never a nice feeling. This was different. In the final few days, as we got closer to leaving and the house got emptier and stripped of its contents, it began to feel affronted, furious, betrayed.

There had always had quirky, spooky bits, but now it felt like all they’d gathered together in one atmosphere of condemnation. I brought you up, sheltered you, provided for you all, I could almost hear it saying. I’ve always been there and now you’re leaving me?

I was the last one to leave after the removal people had gone. As I locked the front door for the last time, I could not get down that path quick enough. My car was parked right in front of the gate, the passeneger side facing the house. I got in the other side and went to start the car and as I did, I felt something leap, no, pour into the seat next to me.

Even thought I couldn’t see anything, I could feel its physical presence. It filled the space and felt human sized. It was the exactly the same sensation when you have a passenger in the car and you look away for a second, or you’re concentrating on the road, but you know that they're there.

As calmly as I could, I said aloud: “I’m sorry, but you can’t come with me.” With that, I started the engine, turned the car round and drove back up the lane for the last time, hands gripping the steering wheel, eyes dead ahead, not looking behind.

By the time I’d got back to my flat, a 25 minute drive away, the car felt completely normal again. I did heavily smudge myself with white sage when I got in though, just to make sure. And said a little prayer and a thank you to Foxhill, feeling safe to do so now.

Despite being semi-obsessed by the supernatural, I’ve never had my own ‘real’ ghost story to tell. But as I continue to write AYOG, I realise my life has always been full of little interactions with things I can feel, just not name. Maybe they’re happening on a much more regular basis than I, or any of us realise, but we’re always too busy rushing around, on our phones, lost in our heads.

What - or who - did get in the car with me at Foxhill that day? Was it trying to leave with me, or make me stay? As a self-appointed paranormal journalist, I have to look at both sides. I could have imagined it. I was tired after weeks of packing. I was definitely emotional. But as I write now, I know it’s not a made up memory. It’s sometime that happened to me, clear as day.

The other way to describe it is, you’re know when you’re waiting for someone in your car, and someone unexpected sticks their head through the open window instead? You’re on the back foot and feel momentarily invaded. That’s how it felt. Someone, or something, got in the car next to me. It just wasn’t human.

I’m pleased to report I didn’t bring anything untoward away. At least I hope not. I am aware that some of you have stayed at Foxhill with me over the years, and I want to assure you that it was always a happy place. Until we broke up with it.

Or, maybe you had your own spooky stories from your visits that you never told me about. If so, I would love to know. If you have any other haunted childhood homes you’d like to talk about, please send ‘em my way.

Sometimes we can get the sense if someone is talking about us (or in this case, writing). I wonder if Foxhill feels the same… this could be a story that unravels in its own time, bit by bit.

Say boo to a ghost

Before I leave you, I’ve got a really important question and it’s not when you think they will reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Should I buy this T-shirt?

My ghost-fluencer (try and say it - GHOST-FLU-ENCER) spring wardrobe is severely lacking, but there’s a fine line between an ironic novelty t-shirt and crap pyjama top from Tesco. Ghost of Disapproval T-shirt, a BOO or a WOO HOO? Let me know in the comments below!

Until time, stay ghosty!

Jo x

I was going to write about my own experiences this week, but I need more time to think about it. As a writer, you are sensitive to how you portray those you’ve been close to. It might sound a bit mad that a 50-year-old woman is worried about pissing off her old home, but that’s how it feels. Much like our relationships with people, houses can bring mixed emotions. On that cliffhanger, I will bring you the full story next week.

Which brings me onto the haunted house theme we’re going with this week. I’m listening to a new paranormal podcast series, Otherworld. I like it because the presenter largely stays in the background and lets the person tell the story.

On this particular episode, a US woman recounted growing up in a remote Midwest home that had odd things going on. The house she said, had an “intelligence.” There was a persistence feeling of being watched. Strange knockings were heard around the house, which seemed to follow her around.

School friends refused to stay there. The deliberate tread of cowboy boots were heard on the wooden veranda outside when there was no one there. The family’s two dogs would stiffen and growl at seemingly nothing, emitting strange, guttural noises from their throat.

One night when the girl was home alone, her parents an hour away by car, she heard the footsteps again and then a man “without a face” appeared at the veranda door. In a panic she called the nearest neighbour. No intruder was found. As the podcast host quite reasonably pointed out, if you are going to be a Peeping Tom, heavy cowboy boots perhaps aren’t the best choice of footwear. Plus, the property was miles from anywhere.

Another time, a friend who did stay overnight, was so convinced something was watching them from the darkness outside, she insisted a heavy duvet was hung over the bedroom window. Curtains weren’t enough from whatever was perceived to be looking in.

Eventually the girl grew up and the family sold the house. An older couple moved in, and as far at the storyteller was aware, nothing paranormal had been reported since. This is a common theme heard in haunted house stories: while one set of inhabitants report having terror reigned upon them, the next people don’t experience a thing.

The 1970s Amityville haunting in Long Island, New York, was so famous it was made into a best-selling book and film, The Amityville Horror. It remains one of the most iconic horror stories today. The house had been the site of a multiple murder, when the 23-year-old son of the previous owners had shot dead his parents and four siblings. On orders he subsequently claimed, from voices who told him to kill.

George Lutz and his young family lasted a whole twenty days at the property, during which time George apparently went under some sort of possession, green slime oozed through the walls and the children levitated above their beds. Mind you, I have witnessed to a similar scene babysitting my nieces once, when I unknowingly gave them each a bottle of J20 an hour before their bedtime.

There were doubts thrown over the validity of the Lutzes claims, and subsequent owners reported no paranormal activity, including the current family, who bought the house in 2017.

The Amityville case clearly had some Hollywood storytelling injected into it, but it takes me back to the Otherworld podcast guest’s comment about her house having an ‘intelligence’. Is there a latent consciousness in houses ignited by certain people who live there?

A theme that has been discussed previously on AYOG is some entities can feed off your energy. And families have a lot going on. A common paranormal troupe is that kids can see dead people, while dark forces feed off the angst of adolescents.

Can houses also take offence? You’ll remember week 14 of AYOG and the ‘haunted rat flat’, where my friend’s previously peaceful apartment had kicked off when she started to refer to it in derogatory terms. Are houses and humans really so different: that everyone gets on nicely until they don’t?

When forces collide

It makes me think of epigenetics, which I still don’t know loads about. The basest theory is that our genes are switched on as much by environments and experience as they are by biology alone.

Is it the same for some houses? After all, they hold so much history. They are the places we spend the most time in, where we pour our heart and soul into, where so much of life happens - the good and bad.

They are also full of living stuff - natural materials, plants, animals and things made by other people. There is a philosophical theory called ‘panpsychism’ believed by some (including physicist and Nobel Prize winner Roger Penrose), that suggests that some form of consciousness might be a fundamental property in everything. Do pebbles get FOMO? That’s one mind-boggling route I can’t start going down (apparently they don’t).

It could just be that there are some people who believe in ghosts and some who don’t. Accordingly, you will have whichever experience you choose. Or might there be something else at work: can houses, much like people, bring out the best - and worst - in us? Once we shuffle off the mortal coil, do we leave pieces of us behind in places we don’t want to leave?

As Albert Einstein once said: ‘Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed from one form to another.’ Don’t know about you, but I always feel much better posing a paranormal theory when I’ve got Einstein on my side.

Whether we believe in the supernatural or not, we all have a relationship with our homes. We can love or hate them - do our homes do the same back? Can houses suffer from empty nest syndrome, or even have family favourites?

Lots of unanswered questions this week. I feel another interview with an expert coming on. Kirstie and Phil don’t feel quite right. Haunted homes don’t have to be a bad thing and people have reported living quite contentedly with their deceased co-dwellers. It can be one big happy family until it’s not - which is what I will be talking about next week.

So the next time you walk through your front door, check your vibe. You never know who you might attract…

On that mildly unsettling note, I wish you all a peaceful Sunday.

Until next time, stay ghosty!

Jo x

You are talking to an official ‘woo woo expert’. My piece on spiritual charlatans came out in the good ship HELLO! this week (I haven’t started writing about paranormal royals, they’ve started a midlife section).

If you want to know how to spot a fake psychic, or how much money I spent going to see them, you can read about it here Scammed by spiritual charlatans

On the opposite end of the spectrum, regular ghosties will recall renowned psychic medium of fifty years Julie Cryer, who I interviewed in week 4 of AYOG.

Julie was around long before the surge of social media spirituality and there is zero whiff of the woo about her. On a good psychic Julie says, ‘Their communication should be as good in this life as it is in the next one.’

Meaning, someone who claims to have a hotline to the spirit world should be equally easy to get hold of this end. Only ghosts themselves are allowed to be ambiguous. Having a reading can be a big deal for some people and it’s only natural that you might have some questions beforehand.

If you are paying to see a psychic or similar, it’s a professional service and should be treated as such. Beware anyone who’s vague about how much a reading costs says Julie Cryer, or how long it lasts. Know who and what you are getting upfront - on the price and T&Cs anyway.

When I started this journey, spiritual safeguarding wasn’t something I thought I’d be banging the drum about (indeed, I’d planned on being enlightened by now), but it’s a marketplace these days and should be treated as such. As I say in my piece, anyone can call themselves a sexy witch and charge you buckets of money for the privilege.

Having had the cosmic wool pulled over my eyes one too many times, I am becoming evangelical making sure the same doesn’t happen to others. Forget witch hunters, there’s a new woo hunter on the scene, and she’s over on Instagram, sniffing out the snake oil.

A beginners guide to reiki

Onto the subject of reiki. Reiki and PayPal are the same to me: I still don’t really understand them, but I know that they work and are legitimate transactions. For those of you unfamiliar with the concept, reiki is a relatively modern healing practice developed in the early 20th century.

The word combines two Japanese terms: rei (universal/spiritual) and ki (life energy) - so roughly, ‘universal life energy.’ The core idea is that a practitioner channels healing energy through their hands into a recipient, with the aim of promoting physical, emotional and mental wellbeing.

While there is little clinical evidence supporting reiki’s effectiveness, that doesn’t mean it’s been discounted: reiki is now offered on the NHS alongside conventional medicine, including at Guy’s and St Thomas’ hospitals in London.

Practitioners are attuned through a training process and has three levels of training, with the highest being ‘Reiki Master,’ which allows you to teach and attune others.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

I am definitely more renegade master but randomly, I am also trained in animal reiki level 1. As many of you know, I am an ambassador for TOLFA, an awesome animal charity in Rajasthan, India. Years ago, on one of my first trips out there, a holistic pet therapist called Alison McKinnon happened to be running an animal reiki course. Someone had dropped out at the last minute and I was lucky enough to step in.

My memory is awful these days, but I think we had our reiki channel opened (I am not doing Alison’s teachings any favours, but she is fab) and afterwards, we had to go out and practice. I remember going over to some puppies and awkwardly baring my palms at them, like I was Jesus.

To say they were underwhelmed was an understatement. Warming your hands on a radiator would have been more of a healing act. I eventually reverted to type and offered them biscuits, which had far more of a positive effect. At least I am someone who knows when she is out of her spiritual depth.

From beyond the grave: the healing power of love

I can’t explain it myself - reiki that is - but I do believe in it. TOLFA has a very holistic approach and their mantra is ‘Healing from the Heart’. Indeed, there are some true reiki powerhouses who work their magic on the animals there.

Reiki is not just a transmission of energy, it’s the language of love. With that, I leave you with the tale of Kite Kat and Shahid, two cats with a bond that transcended death…

‘Shahid and Kite Kat arrived at TOLFA together as kittens, sharing the same cage from the very beginning,’ recounts the wonderful J, who works at TOLFA, alongside the equally wonderful R.

‘Kite Kat was a very nervous, timid cat and Shahid gave her confidence and grounding. For years after their release into the shelter, the two were inseparable.’ One day tragedy hit when Shahid died unexpectedly from an aneurysm.

‘Kite Kat fell apart,’ says J. A few days after Shahid’s death, the cat was found collapsed in one of the dog kennels, complete with dog in it, having apparently fallen from the wall. ‘It was completely out of character for such a nimble, physically confident animal,’ J recalls.

Medical treatment couldn’t help Kite Kat, and there was no obvious physical cause for the collapse.

Back in the cat house, she lay there inert, seemingly having given up on life. ‘R and I decided to try reiki, hoping it might help her find a way to move on,’ says J. The two women sat separately, in silence, trying to reach Kite Kat in her pain.

Afterwards, they discovered they’d both had the same story. ‘I had sensed that Kite Kat wanted to go and be with Shahid, but that he wanted her to stay at TOLFA,’ J says. ‘His death had been so sudden and traumatic and he hadn’t want to go. He was clinging to his connection with TOLFA through her.’

R had actually ended up doing reiki with the departed Shahid, who had told her the same thing. ‘R asked him, gently, to let Kite Kat go,’ says J. ‘Less than ten minutes later, Kite Kat died.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​’

Wah. I don’t know about you but that gives me beautiful goosebumps. On that tearjerker, it's time to bid you farewell. We always welcome animals from the afterlife at AYOG, so if you have any paranormal pet stories, please send them over.

Until next time, beware of Instagram sexy witches and stay ghosty!

Jo x

Understandably, all H wanted to do was lie on a sun lounger, read books and eat nice food. I had other plans for us.

Good sort that she is, I somehow persuaded her to kick things off with four days at a detox retreat. As you can see, I’m really good fun to go away with. We arrived fresh from Bangkok and an accidental night in a ping pong bar, where a lady had fired spherical objects out of her nether regions at us, while we giggled nervously over watered down cocktails, a cluster of freshly bought fake Gucci handbags at our feet.

The detox place was on the island of Koi Samui and had promised rest and rejuvenation, amidst enticing photos of golden beaches and palm trees. Along with a juice fast, we would also be doing self-administered colonics. The website was admittedly rather amateur looking but like I said, it was the early 2000s. I had high hopes. And a constipation problem to be dealt with.

Instead of a tropical Home and Away, which was how I’d been envisaging it, we were greeted by a concrete complex that was more detention centre than wellness spa. There was a swimming pool with no water in it. The advertised ‘luxury colonic suites’ turned out to be a set of old-school toilet cubicles, each equipped with a sieve (don’t ask) and bucket with hosepipe attached, hanging from a rusty hook at the back.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre vibes aside, there were about ten other guests, all in varying levels of thin-ness or excess, depending on how long they’d been there. Our disappointment only deepened when we met the owner, a doddery old English bloke who, according to the female Thai manager, “spent most of his time in Bangkok.” Hmm.

After a welcome talk and meet and greet, he proceeded to give us a demonstration of how to administer a self-colonic. A “special cleansing tonic” was extravagantly produced in a plastic bottle. He was about to mix it into a bucket of water when his manager stepped forward to gently point out he was actually using a bottle of bleach. And apparently we were meant to feed this up our bum.

The whole thing was just awful. There was a pair of malevolent weighing scales in reception to track your progress, which didn’t move the whole time I was there. I will spare you the details of the colonics, aside from the fact I’ve felt queasy about using colanders ever since.

I am getting onto the ghosty part. One of the other guests was a sixtysomething lady, a posh hippie type who, it transpired, lived in the same part of London as H and I. She had a floaty, otherworldly manner and spent six months of the year in India. I was a bit intrigued.

The next day I bumped into her and we started chatting. She told me she hadn’t eaten anything solid for 21 days. Even I, deep in diet culture at the time, was a little taken back.

Wasn’t that a little extreme, I asked? We were barely on day two and I was already thinking about gnawing my own arm off.

‘I feel fantastic,’ she assured me, although she was definitely on the emaciated side.

Fixing me with a stare, she continued. ‘It’s really opened up my psychic senses.’

‘Oh really?’ I asked, leaning in.

‘Yes, I’m seeing spirits everywhere.’ Her eyes strayed beyond my shoulder, widening. ‘There’s one behind you right now!’

I started violently, but there was nothing there. Not as far as I could see anyway - hunger had taken my eyesight by then - but she was giving off intense energy that made me want to leave.

Making my excuses, I did so. Every time I saw her after that, it was as if she wasn’t alone, as if she was in communion with something. I’m all for talking to myself, but it’s a bit different when you appear to be having a conversation with someone who isn’t there.

It might have been the starvation kicking in but the whole thing unsettled me, as did everything about that bleak, dismal place that had promised thin thighs and lasting happiness. I’d have had a better time on Poop Cruise. Two days later the whole ordeal was over and we left, joyfully, for food, booze and normal toilets in Phuket.

Back home we never bumped into the starved psychic seer and it was probably for the best. Like stag dos, what happens at self-colonic wellness spas should stay there.

A self-administered exorcism

Fasting has long been used as a purification tool in religious and devotional practices as a way to get closer to God. I was there for the colon cleanse and weight loss, but can it help the curious amongst us see ghosts?

I decided to have a look into it but mad Reddit threads aside e.g: ‘Have you ever fasted for a supernatural encounter? How long did it take? (the consensus was 3-4 days), there isn’t much supporting starvation as a way to develop one’s psychic mediumship. But fasting does help with mental focus and clarity (5:2) and there’s something to be said for sharpening our senses.

I know that my own senses, dulled by a diet of dross, distraction and endless Vinted scrolls (Vrolling?) could certainly do with wakening up. I’m not about to go nil by mouth but now spring’s here, I’m determined to wake up my winter brain and get out amongst the daffodils. Will becoming more alive to nature make me more aware of ‘other natures’? Watch this space… just don’t shout, ‘It’s behind you!’

AYOG Trend of The Week

Reverse Haunting

As heard on spooky podcast the Paranormal Files, reverse hauntings are where the living intrude on the dead. According to the podcast, there have been reports of spirits reacting in fear to human presences, while other entities attached to certain places don’t like new people on their patch. Even if it is two hundred years later. One theory speaks of ‘overlapping dimensions’ - two worlds occupying the same space, each convinced the other has no right to be there. Are the dead haunting us, or hiding from us?

On that note, have a great week and try not to scare any spirits.

Until next time, stay ghosty!

Jo x

Sometimes the best stories happen when you’re not looking for them. I was in a team meeting last week and at the end, my lovely colleague L turned to me.

‘I’ve got a good ghost story for you. Something strange that happened, not to me but my sister and mum.’

As you can imagine, my ears leapt to attention. ‘Do tell,’ I said. By crikey, she didn’t disappoint. Here in L’s own words, is her account of what she calls ‘My Shepherd’s Bush Stable Story.’ Take it away…

“In the mid-2000s I was lucky enough to rent an old converted stable block tucked behind a Victorian house in Shepherd’s Bush, just south of the Green on Westwick Gardens. You accessed it through the owner’s garage and utility room, then down a garden path - it felt like a secret annex hidden from London.

After nightmare noisy neighbours in my first flat, it was exactly what I needed. A peaceful little oasis. It backed onto a church and the only outside sound was Sunday morning hymn singing drifting over the wall… and, very occasionally, an amorous couple a few doors down who rather enthusiastically enjoyed their garden. Thankfully not often.

Inside was a large open living area downstairs, with a small staircase up to a bedroom, bathroom and little study. I decorated it entirely with my own things — Indian fabrics and bells I’d brought back from my first trip to India shortly after moving in. It felt happy. Safe. Completely mine.

I lived there for two and a half years and never experienced anything remotely strange.

My mum came to stay first, sleeping on the sofa downstairs. She never mentioned anything unusual. A few months later, my sister stayed — again, no comment at the time.

It wasn’t until years later, after I’d moved in with my now-husband, that my sister casually asked my mum: “How did you sleep at L’s’s flat?”

And then she described - in detail - the exact same experience my mum had never told me about.

Both of them woke in the night hearing someone skipping or running lightly down the staircase. As if brushing past the hanging bells - making them jingle - then moving across the room, lifting or rippling the duvet on the sofa… before disappearing through the wall where the original stable door would once have been.

Neither of them are remotely prone to hokey-cokey paranormal thinking. They hadn’t mentioned it at the time because it felt odd, but not frightening. When they eventually compared notes, they were stunned that the experience was identical.

Strangest of all - both said it felt like a happy presence. Not unsettling or heavy. Just… light. My mum felt it was a youngish child. Skipping down wooden stairs (they were carpeted when I lived there) and a sensation of something floating over the top of her as she lay in bed.

I never experienced anything myself.

For me, it was simply a joyful, secure bolthole - my first real independence in big old London.

But perhaps it wasn’t entirely mine!”

ENDS

Ooh! Later on, L messaged to say she’d looked into the history of the place (really, this should be a guest edit version of AYOG). I’ve taken the house number out just in case RightMove/the owners sue me or something. Back to L:

“I did a little digging into XX Westwick Gardens and the wider street history - here’s what I found:

Westwick Gardens was developed in the late Victorian period (late 1800s), when Shepherd’s Bush was expanding from farmland into residential streets. At that time, it was really common for larger houses to have separate coach houses and stables at the back - often accessed via side paths or service lanes.

The area was previously agricultural land, so it’s completely plausible that some of the tucked-away outbuildings were originally service buildings before being converted into separate dwellings in the early 20th century when horses/carriages became obsolete.

I couldn’t find a specific online record confirming that number XX was officially the coach house/stables for a particular house - that would need historic maps or borough archives to verify - but structurally and historically it absolutely fits the pattern of how Victorian suburban houses were arranged.

Which makes the whole ‘original stable door wall’ detail even more intriguing…”

ENDS

How about that? Fascinating, on many levels. I like this one because you never really hear about happy hauntings. I like to think of positive energies bustling around the place, brightening us up with their good vibes.

Last week I told you about my conversation with Sophie, the chatty young Victorian ghost I met in my friend’s flat. If I close my eyes now, I have a sense of her personality as much as I do of anyone I’ve met briefly and had a short conversation with. If you do believe in the unseen world, who could be with us right now, just in another dimension?

I find that rather comforting - obviously I'm talking about the good ones. We might say flat out there’s no such thing as ghosts but we can’t really ever prove it. I am reminded me of a phrase I once heard:

Absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence.

In the same vein, the two biggest things in life - love and our minds - also have an absence of evidence. We can’t measure them and we can’t physically prove they exist. I can tell someone I love them and I might really love them, but they can’t see my love. It’s not something that can be quantified.

Similarly, I can’t prove the existence of my thoughts or yours, as real as they feel. Love. Our minds. Ghosts. We happily accept the first two without any physical evidence of being real: can we really argue so convincingly against the third?

On that little melon twister, I shall bid you adieu. Have a wonderful week and until next time, stay ghosty!

Jo x

Hope to find you all well. Coo, it’s all been kicking off in spirit(ual) land this week! New details have emerged about global wellness guru Deepak Chopra’s close friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. According to reports, Chopra’s name appeared more than three thousand times in the recently released Epstein files - communications that postdate Epstein’s 2008 conviction for procuring sex with a minor.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Choice highlights include discussions about ‘cute girls’ between the pair and Chopra’s comment in a 2017 email exchange that: ‘God is a construct. Cute girls are real.’ Epstein was sixty four at the time, while Chopra was seventy years old.

While Oprah’s longterm friend and business partner has denied any wrongdoing, (Chopra’s wife reportedly told a journalist to ‘talk about something nice’), the fall out has been pretty bad for the man who has made millions selling higher consciousness to us unenlightened mortals.

Chopra-Epsteingate has also opened a whole can of worms about the dark underbelly of the spiritual industry, which is rife with egoism, sexual misconduct and more. There have been lots of interesting articles about it on here, including PR well-balanced take on being part of the multi-billion-dollar spiritual marketing machine.

On talking about the unchecked, unchallenged ‘empowerment influencers’, Dubbels writes: ‘This is how we ended up with… the tier of spiritual figures whose entire identity is built on polished authenticity, algorithmic enlightenment and a kind of relentless positivity that audiences read as depth. It’s a profitable formula, and the system keeps rewarding it.’

Charisma and confidence can get you a long way in this business. I’ve been banging on about spiritual charlatans for a while (see Week 9 of AYOG) and I’ve written an upcoming piece about it for HELLO!’s midlife platform Second Act. Forget Magnum, P.I. I am Carnegie, S.I. Are there spiritual investigator jobs on LinkedIn? Guys, I might have found this week’s new side hustle.

While I jest, there are lessons to take from it. Spiritual scandals are as old as time and I’m not talking about all the alleged ancient wisdom on offer. We always want to believe in better, and there are always people who will exploit that very human vulnerability. Or, at the very least, build an Instagram following out of it. The sooner we wake up to it - and not in the way any of these self-styled spiritual gods promise - the better.

A ghost called Sophie

This week I bring you my own ghost encounter, which I mentioned last week happened in a friend’s living room over a Russell and Bromley shoebox. I’ve told this story to about six people: half who believed it and half who were skeptics.

You may read what follows and think: ‘Get away.’ Yes, it could have been my mind playing tricks. There was a weird corroborating incident that preceded it. Maybe the novelist in me spun a spooky yarn. Or, it could have been a genuinely paranormal experience with a presence not of this flesh and blood world.

In the manner of all good old-fashioned ghost stories, I will recount what happened and leave you to decide.

It was the end of January 2024 and I was visiting a friend, who for the sake of anonymity, I will be calling Britney. Britney lives in a picturesque town up north, famed for its elegant Victorian architecture and spa history. At the time, she was in between houses and renting the ground floor apartment in a converted mansion block.

It was a handsome building with all the usual period features, but maintenance was on the light side and a group of rodents had also moved in. Britney had taken to calling the place the ‘Rat Flat’ and was understandably looking forward to moving on.

It was late January and I’d gone to visit for the weekend. Britney is great at interior design and her signature natural, paraffin-free candles were all around the place. We spent the morning catching up, before deciding to head out for lunch.

Only thing was, Britney couldn’t find her phone. She is not the sort of person to misplace her phone. We looked everywhere and I mean everywhere - kitchen, living room, hallway, bathroom, even the spare bedroom neither of us had slept in.

As we’d spent a lot of time in the kitchen, it seemed the most obvious place to keep searching. There was a two seater sofa by the window and Britney’s handbag was on the right seat. After she’d emptied it out, I clearly remember pulling all the cushions out again and checking down the sides. You’d have seen less rigorous patting down at Heathrow security. Despite our best efforts, the iPhone was nowhere to be found.

Going back into the living room, we had one last search. ‘Oh well,’ Britney declared phlegmatically, ‘We’ll have to go out without it.’ She has two teenage children and runs a big business, so this was not ideal. I was just on my hands and knees in the living room checking under the pouffe for the umpteenth time when there was a shout from the kitchen.

‘Jo! Look at this.’

I went through. Britney was stood looking at the sofa. Sitting neatly in the middle of the previously empty left hand seat, was the missing phone.

We exchanged a look before Britney’s eyes strayed over my shoulder. ‘Did you light that candle?’

I followed her gaze, to where a candle was now burning merrily on the island worktop.

‘No,’ I said. ‘Did you?’

‘No,’ she replied. There was a short pause. ‘That’s weird,’ she said.

‘Weird!’ I said.

Can I also mention at this point, Britney is not the sort of person who would play a practical joke. Honestly, you’ve got more chance of being Punk’d by King Charles.

Another short silence followed, in which we exchanged another look. ‘I don’t like it,’ she said, ‘Let’s go out!’

I was also a bit unsettled by the whole thing, so didn’t argue. We got in her car and sat there for a moment, looking at each other.

‘Weird,’ she repeated.

‘Weird,’ I said. Then she started up the engine and we went out for a nice lunch at a posh garden centre and didn’t mention it again.

Later on that day, we were back at hers, aka the ‘Rat Flat.’ The light was starting to fail and gloom was gathering outside the large sash windows. I was in the living room alone, aside from Maisie, Britney’s mum’s little dog, who was with us for the weekend.

Britney had gone for a kip, but before doing so, had generously offered me a pair of Russell and Bromley boots she’d been sent, as they didn’t fit. ‘If you want them, they’re yours.’

After she’d retired, I made myself a cup of tea and returned to the living room. The lamps had been switched on and the high-ceilinged room was imbued with an atmospheric glow.

Maisie was curled up on the sofa, minding her own business. The boots were still in their shoebox in front of the large fireplace. I crouched down, my back to the living room door, to take a look.

They weren’t quite my style and I was regretfully closing the box, when suddenly I felt someone come up behind me. Like right on top of me. I hadn't heard them coming and I was so startled, it made me speak out loud.

‘Bloody hell, Britney,’ I said, turning round. ‘You gave me…’

There was no one there.

I felt a bit sick and and my heart felt twice the size. I had said Britney’s name because the inappropriate curtain guy was long gone by then and it was only us two in the flat. Who else could it have been? But to be honest, it hadn't felt like her. It had felt like someone - or something - unknown.

In my mind’s eye, which had only just caught up with the sheer physiology of the moment, I’d had a fleeting vision: female, youngish, wearing what I could only describe as a Mary Poppins dress, you know the white blouse and neat grey tailoring.

Now I wasn't sure I liked it. At that point I had two options: either run screaming from the room, or be a bit more chill about my first potential paranormal encounter. Maisie was still lying peacefully on the sofa. If she wasn’t freaking out, that was a good sign. So I decided to go with option B, and have my first attempt at talking to a ghost.

I went over and sat down on the sofa. Not really knowing what to do, I said ‘Hello,’ in my head and then: ‘What’s your name?’

The answer came back straight away. Sophie.

I’ll just explain what happened next because in my own personal experience, a conversation with a ghost isn’t a back and forth exchange. I just opened my head up and another presence filled it.

‘Sophie’ was a young woman, late teens, say aged nineteen. The house had been her family home and she’d been very happy there, she was proud of the building.

Sophie told me she hadn’t liked Britney referring to it as the ‘Rat Flat’ and had hidden her phone to teach her a lesson. It wasn’t malicious. Sophie also admired Britney’s teenage daughter who is a brilliant force of nature, who Sophie said had a lot of ‘spunk.’

(Side note: this wasn't throwing some 19th century shade: back then the term was a ‘common way to describe someone, particularly a person of smaller stature, who is feisty, brave or determined’ (Google).

Then I kept seeing gardens with exotic plants and trees and a sense of animals being around. As many of you know, I am an ambassador for the Tree of Life For Animals (TOLFA), a wonderful animal charity in India. I got the feeling Sophie was trying to reference this and was telling me she’d had animal experiences, too.

After that things kind of petered out and I lost the sense of connection. I didn't feel freaked out, more intrigued. Maisie was still sat quite happily beside me and, as any respectable journalist knows there are two sides to every story, I decided to do a bit of Googling.

First, the name Sophie. Had I heard heard it somewhere that day? And then subconsciously attached it to what I thought I’d experienced, to give it meaning? Or, was it a common Victorian girls name? It could have been the former, but Sophie was also popular name in the 1800s, having gained prominence amongst European nobility.

What about the exotic gardens? Back in the Victorian times, that part of the country had been famous for its zoos, including Leeds Zoological and Botanical Gardens (1840-1858).

Was this forgotten knowledge I’d had? Or again, something I’d subconsciously picked up that day: say a plaque on a wall, or a zoological shepherds pie special in the cafe at the garden centre? You know how shameless those places can be flogging a local theme.

I told Britney about my experience with her live-in ghost. She took it quite well - Northerners are a hardy lot - and shortly afterwards, she and said spunky daughter moved to a different part of town, where there have been no rats or paranormal activity since.

So what do you think, my fellow ghosties? Two midlife women misplacing a mobile? Perimenopausal dementia setting in and making me think I’m speaking with ghosts? Spores from rat mould causing me to hallucinate? Are Russell and Bromley shoeboxes an unwitting portal to the spirit world?

Or, was it a pissed off teenager taking out her haunted hormones on another poor mum? If so, I'm impressed with her candle lighting skills, must save a fortune in extra long matches. As ever, you decide.

Until next time, don’t diss the rats, watch out for Russell and Bromley shoeboxes and stay ghosty!

Jo x

PS do we prefer a Spooky Sunday newsletter? Or is Fright Night Friday still best? Let me know in the comments below, I am here to indulge your ghoulish reading.