I quickly ran inside the house and barged into my sister's room.

"Jesus! Can you knock?" My sister shouted at me.

"I am not Jesus, and I don't think it was in Jesus's character to knock? He walked on water...And he walked through doors. Thus, he didn't need to knock. Anyways, I apologize for barging in but I had to warn you as quick as possible."

Her interest was piqued, "About what? And couldn't you have warned me that you were going to barge in?"

Slightly vexed I replied, "Does it matter? Were you doing something embarrassing?"

My sister paused for a second, and with a tinge of embarrassment she said, "Possibly, I was watching old Flavor of Love clips."

I replied, " That is nothing to be embarrassed about. That show is an absolute gem and is the pinnacle of what great television is in this modern civilization." I was being sarcastic. "Anyways, I barged in to inform you that your place is haunted."

In shock she exclaimed, "What!? Why would you possibly say that?"

"Well maybe because I just found this." I said while I pulled the bone from out of my pocket and showed my sister with contained vehemence.

In a state of perplexity she asked, "What is that?"

"A human bone." I declared.

"How do you know that belongs to a human?" She was testing my knowledge.

"Well if you must know, I got an A in anatomy senior year of high school, thus I know a human bone when I see one." I said proudly.

"Fair enough." She said.

"And this is not just any human bone...No, this bone belonged to a human, who was brutally murdered!" I raised my voice to emphasize the importance of this grave proclamation.

Terror exploded out of her eyes and she lifted her hands to her mouth in utter shock. "The horror! But how do you know they were murdered?" Once again she was testing my knowledge.

"I studied forensics when I binge watched five seasons of CSI three summers ago." I confidently stated.

"Fair enough." She said.

"So now I must know, have you noticed any sort of ghostly happenings since moving in?" I asked.

She raised her hand to her chin and stroked it as she was deep in thought. "You know, now that you mentioned it, things are a little strange around here. I hear a noise every now and then. Sometimes I come home and my trinkets are slightly out of place. My WiFi connection will be poor or not work at all. I heard the laughter of a child a few times... And worst of all, there are times when my food just magically disappears."

After taking in the wealth of information my sister just cast upon me, I did some brief mental calculations and arrived upon a resolute conclusion. "I am sorry to say this Sis, but it sounds like a murdered ghost to me."

"Are you sure!?" She asked with dire concern.

"All the ghostly happenings point to it. We cannot deny the evidence."

"Oh fuck. This is terrible, I just renewed my lease." She looked as if she was about to cry so I had to do something quick because it breaks my heart when I see others cry. It makes me want to give them a hug, a blanket and some warm delicious soup that comes inside a bread bowl.

"Well, just because all the signs point to it doesn't necessarily mean there is a ghost. It could just be a coincidence. I must stay a night to investigate." I was being falsely optimistic because I was quite positive her place was haunted.

In a cheerful manner she replied, "Really? You would do that?"

"What kind of brother would I be if I didn't help out my sister with a probable ghost haunting?" I asked rhetorically.

"A bad one." She quickly answered.

"Exactly! I am going to go home and do research. I will be back this weekend far more prepared and ready to catch this ghost." I said with fervor.

"Ghost? I thought you said there may not be a ghost?" She emphasized the word, not.

I sensed her perturbation, I knew I had to lie.

"Yeah you're right. What I meant to say was that I am ready to catch a ghost if needed, but most likely that will not be needed...Because there is not a ghost in this house haunting you because he or she was brutally murdered. No siree, there is definitely not a ghost roaming inside these walls." I lied, but sometimes we have to tell white lies. It would be quite nice if we could always tell the truth, but the truth is not always pleasant. The truth can hurt. The truth can be too much to bear. Our truths can be downright menacing, therefore we lie to ourselves and we lie to others. Quite often we all prefer the lie, and would love to believe the lie, and that is just the sad truth about the human psyche.

Speaking of lying, who was the first person to even discover the ability to lie? How did they happen upon the discovery? What caused it? And how did they pass the ability on? I am quite certain they abused this discovery. I wonder how long it took before other people realized that the person wasn't being truthful, what lie first became exposed?

Anyways, after leaving my sister's house, I put on my white lab coat and began to do some intense research. I exhausted the topic of ghost hunting with an array of different mediums:

- I read online articles about the topic.

- I discovered what equipment is needed by looking it up on the internet, and then proceeded to order it off Amazon.com in order to receive everything in 2-days due to their shipping efficiency with their Prime membership.

- I followed social media accounts that focused on the paranormal.

- I watched a variety of YouTube videos on the topic.

- I listened to podcasts that discussed paranormal happenings.

- I watched the TV Show Ghost Hunters.

- I watched the films: Ghostbusters, Paranormal Activity and The Conjuring.

- Lastly I rented a few books off the online library database to obtain primary sources on the topic of ghosts.

After compiling a detailed summary of everything paranormal, I felt that it was safe to declare myself a ghost hunting expert in the matter of a few days thanks to the technological marvels of the modern digital age. One can learn everything they want to know on a subject through the power of the internet. The vast library of information is available at our fingertips in seconds, thanks to our handheld devices known as smartphones. Wow! The internet: where facts, statistics and knowledge mingle and replace the need for learning through experience. Abstractions take the place of lived experience. Thanks to the internet, everyone can be an expert now without ever having to leave their room. Thank you internet, let us pray we never disconnect.

After becoming an expert, I returned to my sister's home on Saturday evening with a gargantuan bag of ghost catching apparatuses. My sister opened the door and I said with slight hubris, "Well I'm back, and I have everything I need to catch a ghost."

"Everything?" She asked.

I had to pause for a second to run through my mental checklist. "Shoot! Not everything, hold on I will be back in a second...Well actually a minute...Well more like a few minutes. You know what I mean, I will be back shortly. Yes, shortly works." I hurried back to my car and grabbed the magnetic compass that every single ghost hunting expert stressed was vitally crucial to own if you were to become a serious ghost hunter.

I arrived back at my sister's door shortly, "I left this in my car. This is extremely important to have in concerns to locating and capturing any spiritual entities." I showed her the compass.

Curiously she asked, "What does it do?"

"Help me catch ghosts...duh." The true explanation would have taken far too much time and I didn't want to waste her time with details that she would have found boring. I sadly discovered by this time in my life that rarely are people interested in listening to things they have little to no knowledge about. If they can't contribute to the conversation with their own thoughts and ideas they refuse to be engaged and refuse to ask questions to hear more. They are just looking for the opportunity for when they can speak. A person who listens is a rare as a pearl. The only ones who do listen ensure that they are paid handsomely for this strenuous and agonizing task, they are called therapists; and you must have money in order to be listened to since they are not cheap. The only people who are listened to charge for it by calling themselves experts. People are willing to pay money to listen to those who are considered experts. We have expert speakers who charge money to speak, and expert listeners who charge money to listen. The only exceptions are those who are wildly entertaining...But if they are entertaining enough, they become expert entertainers and once again charge money to entertain. The world of experts. Perhaps the trick is to become an expert, or at least label yourself as one. Everyone loves experts, and will gladly give their money to them.

Well, back to the story. Once I was inside I began to pull things out of my bag, "Uh-huh, uh-huh, just as I suspected."

"What?" She asked.

I was cheerful at that moment because I captured her interest. I guess those Charisma 101 videos were actually working.

"There is no ghost inside this bag." I commented jokingly. I wanted to bring her mood up before I hit her with the troubling news.

"Ha-ha." She sarcastically replied.

"But honestly, there is most definitely a ghost here." I said with a stern expression.

"Are you serious!? How do you know?" She was worried.

"See the way this compass is spinning out of control?" I showed her the compass.

She inspected it with great curiosity, "Yeah?"

"It means a ghost is completely out of control. In plain language, you have an unrested ghost."

Baffled, she asked, "Wait, what? Why? What does that mean?"

"It means you have a ghost whose soul cannot rest because he or she was murdered and seeks revenge. It may decide to displace its revenge onto you. We need to nip this in the bud as soon as possible."

"Yes I agree. Please do what you got to do."

"What I gotta do is grab my ghost capturing vacuum." I grabbed the vacuum and lifted it towards the sky, I turned the vacuum on, and I began to spin around chaotically. After a few wild rotations I turned off the vacuum.

My sister anxiously asked, "So did it work?"

I checked the magnetic compass prior to ensure the accuracy of my response, "The compass seems to be calm. I think I did the trick. That will be $500 for the ghost clean up fee and I will need to return in two weeks to check up on the place to ensure the ghost has not returned."

Outraged my sister asked, "$500!? Are you crazy!? Are you sure you haven't gotten possessed, because you are talking like you have."

"I typically charge $1000 per ghost hunt but since you are my sister I cut the cost in half."

Still aggravated she responded, "What do you mean typically!? This is your first ghost hunt."

I calmly replied, "Can you put a price on your safety? Or on your sanity for that matter? Imagine if I didn't do anything? You've seen the horror films, the characters lose their minds and their lives turn into disarray. If I did not show up and do this favor for you, you would become a raving lunatic."

"You are right, let me write you a check." She began to open up a drawer to grab a check.

"I take cash...Or you can electronically transfer me the money." I said.

"Okay, just give me a second."

"I am just kidding, you don't owe me anything."

"What why?" My sister was curious.

"Your place isn't haunted."

"Because you just captured the ghost?" She pensively asked.

"I'm sorry Sis, but the bone I found was just your dog's bone and this vacuum is just a typical house vacuum that I grabbed from out of my closet. Why do you think it's full of lint?"

"What about the compass and it going crazy?" She was extremely confused at this point.

"When it was going crazy I held it near your refrigerator magnets, and when it was calm, it was away from the magnets."

"What the fuck? Why would you worry me like this?" She was pissed.

"I am sorry. Ghost hunting sounded fun and it provided me with a little meaning and purpose. I think it is safe to say that it spiced up both our lives for this brief period."

"Fair enough, I was kind of excited by the notion that my place could have been haunted." She replied. I was happy she was not mad.

"Yeah, and you could have had a film made after your haunting."

"That would have been dope." She gazed up at the ceiling deep in her imagination.

"Super dope...Well the haunting part would be distressing and far from dope, but if you didn't die from it, it would have been worth it. Nietzsche did say, that which does not kill us, makes us stronger"

"I thought Kanye West said that?" She replied.

"Well he did, but Friedrich Nietzsche was the first to coin it in his book, Beyond Good and Evil." I stated.

"He may have heard that phrase previously."

"Possibly, but either way if you would have survived the haunting, your life would have been on the up and up."

She took a deep sigh and then said, "I could have finally been famous."

"You really do want to be famous."

"It's been a dream of mine, but I think the universe is preventing me because if I was famous I would probably resort to spitting on people and treating them poorly."

Puzzled and shocked, I asked her, "Why in the world would you spit on people? That is not only cruel, but it is also incredibly grotesque, not to mention an effective way to spread disease."

"I don't know. I just feel like I would have an impulse to spit on people." She shrugged her shoulders.

"Okay, well let us all hope and pray you don't get famous then...But anyways, that was fun we must do it again sometime. I got to run because I need to return some of these goods back to Amazon and I have a community yoga class I have to attend tonight, so I'll see you later." We said our goodbyes and I left.

So that was the end of my ghost hunting career. I was one-for-one. Well there wasn't actually a ghost, therefore I did not really have an at bat...But what that brief experience brought me was a distraction, something to fill the void of emptiness and meaninglessness. For those few days I did not suffer from a suicidal thought. Sure it was all completely made up, but I created for myself a small purpose, something to look forward to, something to accomplish, my own little adventure. And few adventures make the jimmies rustle and the nipples harden more than the possibility of a good old-fashioned ghost haunting.