Since I mentioned my Xbox Live avatar yesterday, here’s what my digital doppelganger looks like. I mean, it’s sorta me - in a very superficial way. At least it’s wearing cargo pants and sort of a punk rock t-shirt, which is probably what you’d find me wearing if you bumped into me in the street. Not sure about the face though - sorta looks like an Asian John Lennon - which is totally not what I look like. I think the beard isn’t thick enough. My wife says it looks like me though, so I’ll defer to her judgement.

Story

Today’s ghost story is a touching tale from “Patrick” of Laos:

I was raised in Laos by my mother and her family. Since my parents had always had a bad relationship they divorced shortly after my birth, and since my father was a foreigner I never had more than a passing relationship with him or his family and that fact sometimes made me sad.

In my hometown I would often pass by the house of a certain friend and when she wasn’t there I sometimes saw an old couple that would smile kindly at me and wave. A detail I remember well about the woman is that she always wore a pair of coral earrings shaped like roses. I was very small and although I was curious about the old couple I assumed they were my friend’s relatives and didn’t worry too much about them. I remember I once asked my friend about the couple but she didn’t seem to know what I was talking about and I didn’t worry too much about it although their faces made an impression on me.

When I was about five years old my uncle sponsored my family and we were able to move to the United States where we settled in El Monte California. The strange thing is that I continued to see the old couple every once in a while. I would see them sometimes at the market or taking a walk but each time I saw them for one reason or another I wasn’t able to speak to them they were always a little bit too far. I thought I must be seeing things or that maybe the old people had common faces that I was mistaking everywhere. Anyway, after a certain age I no longer saw the old couple and I stopped giving them thought until many years later when I visited my father’s sister in Chinatown for the first time and immediately noticed an elaborately framed photograph of two young people on their wedding day.

The sight of the picture made me catch my breath. The woman was wearing the same earrings that I had seen on the old woman and she had the same expression in her eyes. My aunt says that it’s a picture of my grandparents and I guess I’ll always wonder if my grandparents spirits felt sorry for me because I didn’t have a father and if they watched over me as a result.

A life-size doll wrapped in plastic (a la Laura Palmer from Twin Peaks) was found in a wooded area near Izu City in Japan. Investigators went so far as to order an autopsy before sussing out the fakery.

Investigators found what appeared to be human remains in a forest in Izu City, a seaside resort in central Japan, after an anonymous caller reported seeing it, a Shizuoka state spokeswoman said on condition of anonymity, citing department policy.

Investigators felt it from outside but never actually looked inside, and brought it back to the city police station for a post-mortem examination, she said. Apparently no one doubted a human body was inside until a medical examiner unwrapped it and found a doll there, she said.

I don’t know if I can rightfuly call this cereal-box tchochke (found in a box of Cheerios this Saturday) ‘tasteless‘ or not. I know General Mills wants me to think ‘Joker’, but I can’t help but think ‘Heath Ledger’. Maybe I’m just morbidly fixated. Either way, I turned it over to my daughter who gave it a test-lick and promptly chucked it under the sofa…so I guess at least one of us found it tasteless.