Youtube find…

I found this on youtube when I was doing my daily “Bloody Mary” search. http://youtube.com/watch?v=aqk8bRc9-kA It looked kind of creepy. I managed to track it down to this site: www.xanga.com/gkaplan. What do you guys think? Any opinions?

The different ways to call Bloody Mary…

So, it seems everywhere has a different way of summoning Bloody Mary. Usually, they involve a mirror and saying her name. The biggest differences appear to be how may times you say Bloody Mary, whether or not to spin around, and how many candles to light. Spinning around is always a common theme too (probably to make you dizzy enough to think you saw something) And some parts of the world think Mary was a woman who was framed for killing her kids and if you say, “I killed your baby,” in front of a mirror, she’d come out and rip you to shreds. It is strange how this legend is all around the world. It makes you think, how did it spread so wide if there wasn’t an inkling of truth in it?

My own story finally comes out:)

I feel like it’s time to talk about my own “Bloody Mary” experience. It almost seems like too much of a build up, but here goes: I was ten years old and my friend and I were having a sleep over. After gossiping about every boy in school, we got bored, and we started talking about our favorite horror movies. When that got us thoroughly freaked, we tried to come up with things we could do that would freak us out more. I would pretend I could hear someone knocking on the door on my back patio. (my whole back yard was forest, so this was particularly creepy) My friend kept on pretending she’d hear someone coming down the stairs (my bedroom was on the bottom floor of my house, so being in the basement, pretending someone was coming down the stairs, was really scary even if it sounds silly) Then I remembered Bloody Mary and we both squealed appropriately and I got the candles. Of course, the candles were actually fake, my parents wouldn’t trust me with real fire in my room, but even the fake ones served their purpose. We went into the bathroom and switched on the candles. I decided to be the brave one and I spun in circles a little more than three times, but we were giggling at this point, so the dizzier the better. We both went to the mirror, and I said, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary. I couldn’t focus, I was so dizzy, so I asked my friend if she saw anything. She said no. And then…in the reflection of the mirror we both saw the window that faced my backyard, and there, staring at us from outside, was a girl with her hands plastered on the window, her mouth was open like she was screaming. We screamed and ran as fast as we could up the stairs to my parent’s room, waking them up and quite frankly, pissing them off. But we wanted my dad to go check it out. When he went down there, there was no girl, no nothing. We didn’t sleep a wink that night and to be honest I didn’t sleep for a week after, I kept the curtains down and put earplugs in my ears. But that moment has stuck with me forever.

More juicy stories...

Okay, I found another link to more stories. Some of these are pretty tough to swallow, but some of them I have to wonder… The Newport, MI story is just sad. Bloody Mary or not, the kid died. How many others have had similar experiences? Maybe getting yourself all worked up about something can freak you out to the point of death. I think people can scare themselves to death. It just shows how powerful of a weapon fear is. If Bloody Mary does exist all she’d have to do is show up in the mirror, that would be enough for most to make them run screaming. I would think it might even be a little fun for her : ) Enjoy the stories, I did! Check them out via the links page on rubloodymmary.com

www.halloween-website.com/bloody_mary_stories.html

Bloody Mary's bloody history...

Some cool extra info that will most definitely be in my paper: A couple of namesakes, one being the most obvious, Queen Mary Tudor (or Mary Queen of Scots, most commonly known), who had almost 300 religious dissenters executed after she changed England’s religion to Roman Catholicism (this didn’t last btw Queen Elizabeth (her successor immediately reversed this once she came into power) But history lesson aside, this is how she got the name, Bloody Mary. There is a DC comic superhero called Bloody Mary, she was pretty bad ass, she was a vampire that used a flying disk ala Green Goblin and can manipulate her enemies by projecting rays from her eyes, and telekinesis to boot. And who can forget Bloody Mary from the musical South Pacific (I can) I hated that movie, but she was a character all the same. But most importantly (to college students anyway) is the drink, V-8 and vodka, yuck. So, just finding the roots of the name Bloody Mary has been interesting. What I still need to find out is how it became a game girls play at slumber parties? From Mary Queen of Scots to mirrors in the dark, quite a leap. The name that comes up the most for the “slumber party” version and the topic of my paper, is Mary Worth. Most of the legends say she was accused of killing her kids and anyone that says her name she thinks of as her accuser and will scratch your face off. How lovely. Some say she was a young girl who was killed by being buried alive and is now out for vengeance. I like that one, anything with a creepy kid, always gets me.

The Bloody Mary Spin-off...La Llorona

I found another cool legend that ties into the whole “Bloody Mary” folklore. This one originates in Mexico and her name is La Llorona, she supposedly killed her children and is now grief stricken, searching for them on the banks of the river, covered in their blood. Creepy. Here’s a link to more info about her:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Llorona

My Friend's Bloody Mary Tale

My friend e-mailed me the coolest Bloody Mary experience yet . My friend shall remain nameless, though her story won’t : ) Apparently, when she was about eight, she went to sleep away camp up in the Pacific Northwest on an Island called Anacortes, about thirty miles from Seattle. She said that everyone was assigned to a cabin, and this is the way she described them: “they were these dingy, dirty, disgusting cabins that looked like no one had cleaned in a century. It smelled like mold and there were spiders in the beds. I wanted to run home as soon as I entered, but my parents would have killed me. I decided in that moment that I would get a case of “food poisoning” the next day.” She knew the other girls felt the same way and she said it bonded them in some weird “Traveling Pants” kind of way. Anyway, on to the good stuff. So, she and her new bunk mates all went to the bathroom a few buildings down, to get ready for bed. This is what she wrote, “there were six of us and we were all giggling and running in the dark, the only way we could see anything was from a small flashlight one of the girls brought. We finally made it to the bathroom though the girls were really starting to freak each other out. The bathroom wasn’t much better than our cabin and this girl Jessica came up with the idea to play Bloody Mary. I was the first to agree and the other four girls didn’t want to be labeled as the “scaredy cats” so they nodded their heads that they were in. Jessica turned off the lights and switched off the flashlight so the only light coming in to the bathroom was from the lights of near-by cabins. This is when Jessica completely chickened out and turned to me saying I should do it. I, personally, wasn’t scared at all, so I smiled and went straight to the mirror. The girls huddled behind me. I looked in the mirror and said, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary, Bloody Mary. We waited. Nothing. I was about to laugh the whole thing off when for no reason the mirror cracked right in front of our eyes! The girls screamed and ran out as fast as they could, but I was frozen. I was actually scared for the first time in my life. I felt like my legs were paralyzed, and I couldn’t stop staring at the crack in the mirror, as if it was always there and we just now noticed it. I tried to slow my breathing down when for a flash of a second I saw something move in the mirror as if someone was standing right behind me. My legs unfroze and I ran. I ran in the dark, tripping, falling, scraping my knees, anything to get back to my cabin which now seemed like a haven of safety. By the next morning, we were all laughing and talking as if we had just defeated a giant. But I still get freaked out whenever I think about that mirror cracking. Creepy.” Pretty cool. My story is kind of similar, so that’s why I think this one freaked me out so much. What’s weird is I’ve known this girl for ten years and we have never talked about our Bloody Mary experiences until now, and they probably happened within a year of each other. It makes me wonder how many people have stories like these that they just never talk about. I promise I’ll tell you my story soon, of course, all this build-up, no one will care, but I’m just not ready to say it yet. Something to look forward to : ) But please, if you have your own story, send it to me right away!

Research is Fun (Especially When It Involves Watching Movies)

I’ve now officially watched three out of the six movies I could find on Bloody Mary, “Urban Legends” being one of them. I don’t know if any of you have seen this, but it’s your typical cheesy horror movie, more laughable than scary. Which was great for me because I scare easily. I’m the kind of girl that has to buy a clear shower curtain for fear of Norman Bates or the decrepit lady from “The Shining” showing up. Bloody Mary has always freaked me out for the fear of looking into a mirror and seeing a psycho in the reflection next to me. What is that??? It works every time in the movies. They’re causally washing their face, they look up, BAM! Someone is in the mirror next to them. CREEPY! To be honest, so far my research has been more fun than really hunkering down and finding out the facts. I’ve found some websites that tell basics, or other people’s experiences, but it’s just so hard to tell if the people are telling the truth or just telling stories. The one thing about the human condition: If you don’t experience it yourself, you tend not to believe it, and everyone is guilty of that. My job on this paper is to keep an open mind and not dismiss every thing, even though my nature tells me too. If it hadn’t been for my “Mary” experience as a child, I would never take any of this kind of thing seriously. I’m listing a bunch of links on my links page on helpful sites, some just informative, some personal stories, and some just ridiculous, but I thought I’d give a variety☺

My Bloddy Mary Mission

Okay. So. I’m starting this blog because I just started a really cool class about Urban Legends. The topic itself appealed to me since I’m completely fascinated by ALL urban legends, but when I found out I actually get a science credit through the Anthropology Dept. I was all in. On the first day, the teacher announced that we would all be doing one paper for the entire semester. Basically, we get to pick our favorite Urban Legend and write about that. I’m doing mine on the myth and/or legend of Bloody Mary. I chose Bloody Mary as my topic for personal reasons. I had a really weird experience as a kid and out of fear, I’ve kind of avoided the subject like the plague. Which is why I wanted to do this paper, deflate my fear by researching the heck out of it. I make my cash for school designing websites, so I thought I’d start a Bloody Mary site of my own. A place where anyone can blog, or share stories, or anything related to Bloody Mary. If you’re not familiar with the legend the basic gist is this: You light a candle in front of a mirror, say Bloody Mary three times and BOOM! She shows up and kills you. As a kid whenever we’d have slumber parties there was always at least one attempt to bring back dear old Mary, but usually the only thing we succeeded at, was scaring ourselves to the point of sleeplessness (which is always fun at a sleep over so I can’t complain) But there was one time, where I swear, something freaky happened. Obviously, I’m still here, so Mary didn’t kill me, but I’m telling you, I definitely saw something in that mirror. Anyway, I may share later, depending on how many people respond to this☺ There’s been about six movies based on Mary, I’ve never seen any of them, but as I am doing this paper, I will be renting them soon. The only one I’ve seen that’s remotely close is Candyman. It’s the same premise. You say Candyman three times in a mirror and he kills you, too. Maybe he’s Mary’s son☺ All things I will be researching for this class. Basically, I want to know: where the legend comes from, how old is the legend, any recorded cases, movies, TV shows, anything and everything. So if you have any stories or know of anything you think I should watch, read or rent, let me know.