Here it is Halloween time again, and I thought, well time again to retell the old story about how Dracula ate my Micky Mouse ring. It’s an old tale, sad but true. I was sure I had given a very detailed account of the event on my blog, but alas, when I looked I found only 1 small reference, well 2, but only one showed up when I searched “Micky Mouse” in my archives, the other one was under “Dracula.”

When I was a child I was painfully shy. (Seriously.) I was terribly afraid to talk to strangers, unless I was animated about a certain subject, and they asked the right question. My mother, of course, knew what the right questions were to get me started on these certain topics. She thought it was really funny for me to explain things to people, because while my explanations made perfect sense to me, adult type people were baffled with my small child reasoning and conviction on the above mentioned topics. Therefore, she would set me up by telling people to ask me questions about my latest obsesion.

One of the big topics was how I was born with a bandage on my head, another important one was how Dracula ate my Micky Mouse ring.

Here’s the story, because I remember this happening:

My mother, brothers, grandmother and I had just gone to the downtown mall. A small, adjustable Micky Mouse ring had been purchaced. It was Micky standing sideways with this little hands behind his back. Adorable, and since I was only 3, even at the smallest adjutable size, it was too big.

After the mall we went to a haunted house. One of the first things to happen at the haunted house was a vampire jumped out at us. That scared me out of my skin, and I literally climbed up my mother’s leg. (which wasn’t easy because she wore a brace.) After that the haunted house was anti-climatic. (Maybe the monsters felt bad about scaring a little girl.) As soon as we got out of the haunted house, I realized that my brand new Micky Mouse ring was gone! And I knew, I knew in my heart that Dracula had eaten my ring! Nobody else would have done it, it had to be him because he was so mean and jumped out to scare me! (I’m not sure why I was convinced that he actually ate it, but that was the immediate conviction on the matter.)

I insisted that we go back and demand my Micky Mouse ring back! Oh I was livid about the affair and my mother said, “Are you going to tell Dracula to give it back?” and I said yes I would! So, we all trouped back to the haunted house and of course Dracula was the first to greet us again, an naturally I lost all my resolve and hid behind my mother. She asked about the ring, he said he never saw it, but I knew he was lying!

I knew he ate it! We looked around just incase, but it was gone, and I was so mad! So, ever after if my mother wanted to get me started, even into my adulthood, all she had to say was, “Ask Shannon about her Micky Mouse ring.” My response was always, “Dracula ate it!” And I would launch into this story about the haunted house and how scary Dracula was, and how mean he was to eat my ring and none of the other monsters were as mean or scary or bad as he was!

I still don’t like vampires, (well, who does? But I have an origional reason at least) and I still want my Micky Mouse ring back!