Eerie Episodes or Things That Go Bump in the Night

I'm sure that there are many of us who have experienced weird things so thought I would start off by sharing this with you as I have never been able to explain it rationally....................Many years ago in the 1980s I, with a male colleague, accompanied a group of students on a week's RE Course to Woodcote Hall in Shropshire. I had my own room in the girls' section.I remember it was May as our Wedding Anniversary was on the Thursday of that week. The first night I awoke in the early hours and the room was freezing. I had to get out of bed and put on my dressing gown which I then slept in............. I woke up after a restless night and remembered that I had heard a tapping sound, faintly at first and then getting nearer and fading away. It sounded like a walking stick. I didn't say anything at breakfast and when the pupils went for activities etc I went to the library to tackle some A level marking. I knew I couldn't be late for lunch as no-one could start until everyone was there............This was a good way of ensuring punctuality from the students but it applied to the Staff also. I looked at my watch and to my horror saw that I was an hour late!!!:nailbiter::shocked::oops: Panic-stricken I ran downstairs and saw my colleague Pete who had been for a walk in the grounds. He told me it wasn't lunch time. I told him about my watch and he was as nonplussed as I was. I then adjusted it to the correct time. I must say that this watch was a gold Accurist and was a 21st birthday present from my mother. It had kept perfect time since then and the only adjustments I made were in October and Spring.

As we were not needed during the day Pete suggested that after lunch we could have a drive to see the Iron Bridge, the famous bridge built by Telford. He had travelled by car while I had been in the mini-bus driven by another member of staff who had gone back to school. We had a lovely afternoon even managing a drink in the village pub....naturally!:cheers:I looked at my watch and.......it was two hours fast!!:confused::confused: I then told him about the cold room, the tapping sound and questioned what was happening to my watch. Science teacher or not he couldn't explain it. When we got back I took off the watch and left it in my room. After dinner when the staff and I were gathered for coffee I told them of the strange happenings. In the room were two Brothers (monks), two priests, two nuns and us. One of the Brothers was very interested, especially in the tapping noise and told me that Woodcote Hall was haunted by an old monk who walked with a stick. I looked at him and told him he was having me on. Everyone was laughing:laugh::laugh: so it was rather difficult to know if he was telling the truth. They all seemed to enjoy the story though.

Over the next few days I experienced a very cold bedroom. I asked the girls if their shared rooms were cold at night and they said no.:confused::confused: I heard the tapping every night and even checked the radiator in the bedroom.....wasn't coming from that!! So during those May nights I slept in pyjamas and a dressing gown while my watch simply went mad.....gaining hours every day.:nailbiter::nailbiter: On the last day which was Friday the mini-bus arrived around 10 to transport us back to school while Pete left with three pupils in his car. On the motorway I asked my colleague for the correct time and adjusted my watch for the first time since I had taken it off. When we got back to school it was still correct and was accurate for many years after.:surprised:

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Here's 'a strange but true' story. During a hot night last summer (yes, we did have one or two!), our local vet awoke to find an owl sitting on the chest of drawers at the end of her bed. She got a bit of a fright but shooshed the owl out and thought no more of it. The next night she was again sleeping with her windows wide open - again she woke in the night sensing there was something in the room and there was the owl, again sitting on the chest of drawers at the end of the bed. As she got up to usher it out she noticed that its beak was broken meaning that it couldn't feed. She took it to her surgery, phoned the Vet Hospital in Glasgow for advice and tried her best to treat the poor thing. Unfortunately, her ministrations came to nothing and she had to put the bird down. It was sad because a story like that really deserves a happy ending but at least the poor owl didn't suffer an agonizing death by starvation. The weird thing is why did the owl choose that house of all the houses on the island? Perhaps the old wives' tales are true and owls are truly wise old birds!

That is a strange tale.....just goes to show how little we know of the links between the species. What a shame it had a sad ending.

Something weird happened to me last year. I was talking with a friend about losing loved ones and she lost her mum many years ago and mentioned that she say a white feather now and again and took that has a sign her mum was watching over her. I had lost my grandad 6 years ago and told her I had never seen a white feather or had any sign but it would be nice to get a sign. Thought no more until the next day as I was driving home from work and a white feather appeared on my windscreen and stayed there until I parked the car. I thought it was strange how it didn't blow away as I was driving. :confused: I got out of my car and as I was walking away I looked back and the feather calmly drifted away from my car.

Weird but rather lovely...wish something like that would happen to me.