Overview: This is my second installment of my memories of cruising. I am doing this for my own sanity and to remind everyone of our positive times in the past and what the future might bring. During these troubling times with politics and a global pandemic, focusing on something we all consider to be positive is good therapy. Add in your comments of how or what you would do on your day-two when cruising. Lets have some fun with this and leave our negativity out. Try just to have fun in our thoughts.
Disclaimer: I am retired 63, a stroke victim yet healthy now, gone on 24 cruises, and spoiled to the core. My reference to the NCL Haven™ is not meant to show what I can afford or I am better than anyone else. It is just my personal favorite experiences. Truth be told, my best cruise was my first. That was 40 years ago, in the cheapest inside cabin on the SS Norway. It was my honeymoon and it was magical. My next cruise in the end of May 2021, will be my 41st wedding anniversary on the same cruise line, now called NCL with my Adult Children. A full circle over 40 + Years.
Day 2: Cruise Memories
06:45 AM: I just can’t sleep in today, just can’t. Shower and in-suite coffee on the balcony. All you can see and hear are lovely waves. This is what I have been waiting for all year.
07:30 AM: First Breakfast in the Haven Restaurant. We start with French Press Coffee, of course. Appetizer of smoked salmon from the side fresh buffet, those danishes are calling my name though. With a huge smile, I order my favorite Breakfast, Steak & Over Easy Eggs skip the potato’s. Whole wheat toast with grape jelly. At the end, I always get one single danish. I am trying to not gain my normal 10+ lbs. from this cruise. I am quite clear in my own mind, I will fail.
09:00 AM: Explore the ship. Even after 24 cruises, going deck to deck is so much fun for me. People are just getting up. Still easy to get an elevator and no real crowds in the main walkways. Important to me to find the cigar bar for later enjoyment and there it is next to the Mojito Bar. Also, where is the slot tournament to be held at 01:00 PM, priorities folks. Where is the gym and finally where all the hot tubs on board.
10:30 AM: Gym. 30-minutes on the treadmill. Attempt to allow a bit of those food calories to get used. I know by day three, the exercise will be doomed. All I can think about is going down those huge water slides and driving the electric go carts. My hope is the lines are not to long. On my way back to my suite, I hear that wonderful sound of metal drums by the main pool. The smile begins to become a part of my day, as it always does on past cruises. Entering my suite, my family asks where I have been. I tell them and they are disappointed I did not take them with me. What I see is none of them have even gotten out of bed yet.
12:00 PM: Lunch by the Haven Pool another favorite pastime. Time for the best cheese burger on any cruise ship. No bun, of course. Really, no bun. French Fries YES, bun no? My wife orders a bottle of wine and takes half of it goes back to the room. God love that upgrade to the Premium Plus Drink Package. My wife loves ordering a bottle vs. a glass. It is a vacation isn’t it. This was her plan and I support it. She loves wine in the suite for night time balcony viewing.
01:00 PM: Slot Tournament, my entire family is entered, it is a tradition. We learned to have a few drinks first, because it is so stressful. We always play and never win. This year, my wife whom never gambles makes it to round two. We are so proud of her and consider that a victory. Since I am in the casino anyway, where is that “Buffalo Gold” machine. I feel the cash leaving my wallet forever. Why do I watch those YouTube Slot Guru’s. They are not good for my pocketbook.
02:30 PM: A littler poorer yet still happy, I get ready for my first water slide experience. Every cruise I do the same thing. I find someone whom is a afraid to do the water slide, and talk them into doing it with me. My record for number of consecutive slides is 10. The issue are those darn stairs, I am no spring chicken anymore. All the kids think I am funny because I am as excited as they are to slide. My last victim was my wife who became a huge fan.
04:00 PM: Did I hear “BINGO” or was it “Deal or No Deal”. It is like a magnet for me. The crowds, the joy of watching someone WIN. I debate myself. Do I start drinking NOW or hold off until right before dinner. Hold off today, smart move. I go back to the suite through the casino watching a older woman (that is saying a lot, I am 63) get a jackpot on the machine that took all my money earlier. Happy for her though, kind of.
05:30 PM: There are some ship snacks waiting on the table in the suite, which is always different every day. Today it is those world famous chocolate covered strawberries. Time to clean up and dress for dinner and the show. My wife as usually, is looking at the sun burn she got sitting on the deck and saying, “I think I over did it a bit.” I notice she is in a very happy mood and the bottle of wine in the room is out. I ask her when she started drinking? She smiles and tells me, 12:00 PM, at lunch. Stupid question on my part. I am the light weight in my family on drinking. However, when I get serious, I am serious. Pre-Dinner drinks on the balcony, it is so lovely.
07:00 PM: Dinner tonight is a specialty restaurant. My habit is to go to the steak place the first night. Martini shaken not stirred, slightly dirty with two blue cheese stuffed olives. Shrimp cocktail, Fresh Bread with really good butter, Blue Cheese Wedge and a Rib Eye Medium Rare Plus. I am so full, I simply can’t eat all the fully loaded potato. Maybe a few bits. I have to sit for a while and have some Coffee with Baileys. I am feeling no pain and starting to relax a bit. New York Cheese cake is the finale. “There is cheating and then there is Cheese Cake!”
09:30 PM: I know I am tired because I would usually be in bed by now. The food, drink and excitement of the day is telling my body, pass on the show. I used to listen to myself, not anymore. I will get my second wind shortly and so will you. The show which on the first night is usually a production. We always sit in the last row on the end by the door. We have seen some fantastic and not so fantastic shows. We are not expecting much. Then the music starts and it is all Latin dancing. 90-minutes has never go so quick. This show was incredible. My wife for the first time was on her feet doing a standing ovation.
11:00 PM: This is when my wife and I start to argue. She wants to party some more, I want to chill in the room. Translation, go to sleep. I know her, the moment she hits the pillow, with the sun she got that day, add the food and drink, that is all she wrote. We get to the suite, on the desk are the passes for the excursion we are taking in the morning, I love that. Never gets old. I, just want to dream again about my next day’s breakfast of Steak and Eggs. Tomorrow I add a waffle I thing. We attempt to look at the agenda for the next day however never make it more then 10-minutes before the waves put us to sleep.
Perfect second day in my book.

Super Bowl Game Breakdown

It’s the last game of the season and we’ll be doing it Breakdown style, even if we can’t call it Game by Game. We should actually get a pretty good matchup between the Chiefs and the Bucs, with the young GOAT taking on the old GOAT. This game is certainly more than Patrick Mahomes against Tom Brady, but we all know that’s the driving force. Let’s get into things and pick out some captain plays for the Super Bowl Game Breakdown to find the green screens!

Chiefs at Buccaneers, O/U of 56 (Chiefs -3)

Chiefs

QB – Provided his offensive line doesn’t fail him, Patrick Mahomes is in a total smash spot. The Buccaneers had their issues against the pass this season, finishing fifth in DVOA against the pass but that doesn’t tell the whole story. They finished 21st in passing yards allowed per game and Mahomes already totally shredded this defense for 462 yards. That was the high watermark on the season and the other aspect favoring Mahomes is the run defense for Tampa.
It is the best in football, and has been for some time. They allowed the fewest rushing yards in the league by almost 10 full yards. Andy Reid and company are going to run just enough to keep Tampa honest, but not much more. Mahomes is going to have ample opportunity to crush this defense yet again.
The question really boils down to if he’s worth a captain pick and I would lean no. If Mahomes is the optimal captain, it likely means one of two things. The first is for him to have multiple rushing scores. That seems unlikely but the other avenue would be spreading the ball around. That doesn’t seem likely either. With Tyreek Hill and Travis Kelce accounting for roughly 60% of the air yards and 50% of the target share, the passing game is too concentrated normally for Mahomes to be optimal. Of course, play him at will but I will likely be underweight at the captain spot.
RB – This spot is fairly ugly in honesty. As of now, we don’t know if the backfield split between Darrell Williams and Clyde Edwards-Helaire continues. In the AFC total game, Williams totaled 14 touches to seven for CEH. That’s not something we’d want to get involved in against such a good run defense. The one reason I won’t totally cast them aside is the Bucs gave up the most receptions to backs in football. CEH had an 11.1% share of the targets and if he’s full go, he could be interesting in PPR formats. Still, this spot is mostly a fade for me. Nobody is really that cheap and I’ll have other priorities. If you’re in a 20 max, a couple shares make sense but that’s as far as I would go.
WR – Let’s hit the way back machine and take a look at part of what I wrote for Hill –
Here’s the really exciting part. Hill plays almost 40% of his routes from the slot. That gets him to Sean Murphy-Bunting in coverage and this man just got pantsed on Monday night. He’s allowing a 2.40 pPT, 137.1 passer rating and a 13.3 YPR. If you think Andy Reid doesn’t know that, think again.
That was before Reek went Godzilla on the Tampa secondary for a massive 60 DK points. Not much of my outlook has changed in the Super Bowl Game Breakdown, but this is interesting. Kelce is more expensive, so I wonder if Hill is the most popular captain since he’s the cheapest of the big three from the Chiefs and everyone saw what he’s capable of against this secondary. Hill is lethal from the slot, and even though Murphy-Bunting is playing better in the playoffs he’s going to struggle. He allowed a 122.7 passer rating and a 2.10 P/PT on the season over 115 targets. Tampa has to come with a different game plan than last time. Having said that, I still think Hill will be one of the most popular options up top and I’ll have shares myself.
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The secondary receiver is up in the air. Sammy Watkins is on track to be active for the first time in the postseason, and we shouldn’t ignore that. He had a 13.9% target share to go with a 14.2% share of the air yards, third-highest on the team. Even though he’s only played in 10 games, he has nine RZ targets which is third on the team as well. Watkins played the slot 34% of the time but would mostly see Jamel Dean who was fifth in YPR allowed at 9.6. The veteran could be a cheaper way to get exposure to the Chiefs passing game and would be my preferred target if he’s active. Watkins would make it tough for Mecole Hardman to get a ton of work, so we’ll update this if we need to.
TE – The elephant in the room is on DK, it’s likely not possible to play Mahomes/Hill/Kelce altogether. The cheapest stack of those three leaves $5,666 per slot after that. That’s if you don’t use any of them at captain. It’s potentially workable but I’m not sure if it’s the best path to take. If you’re making a lineup that has some of the high profile Bucs passing game players, you’re going to have to pick a path here. I ever-so-slightly lean Kelce, since there’s receivers to replace Hill. You can play Mike Evans or Chris Godwin for cheaper and hope that Kelce outscores Hill. Tampa gave up nine touchdowns on the year to tight ends and it’s possible that they get so focused on not letting Reek go nuts, Kelce has a slightly easier path. Even though he is more expensive, Kelce is the Chief I’m least likely to fade.
D/ST – These units should likely not be very popular, but I kind of dig the Chiefs. Tampa turned the ball over plenty last week and Kansas City sports a pressure rate of just about 25%. We all know that pressure is the one aspect that makes Brady a mere mortal. They’ve forced 25 turnovers and actually only allow about 22 points per game. In the first matchup, they forced two picks and had five DK points. That could be enough for the salary.

Buccaneers

QB – I still am not that interested in Tom Brady as captain because he’s honestly hasn’t been playing that well in the postseason. When’s the last time you’ve seen Brady go three straight games with a 55% completion rate and an 8/4 ratio of total touchdowns to turnovers? Maybe the rest week will help him and he certainly has the narrative behind him. You know, it’s not like Brady has lost Super Bowls before or anything. KC finished mid-pack in DVOA against the pass so the matchup isn’t anything crazy bad for Brady. I would tend to think he gets at least 35 attempts, but I honestly don’t totally love the price. I will say I like him better as a captain option than Mahomes. If Brady goes nuts, he’s got a better chance spreading the ball around to multiple touchdown receivers. There’s much more a path to Brady hitting optimal value at captain than Mahomes in my eyes. I’m not going to tell you to not play Brady, but fitting him and Mahomes in will require a punt somewhere along the line.
RB – Speaking of punts, Ronald Jones has entered the chat. All eyes are going to be on Playoff Lenny, a.k.a Leonard Fournette, and with good reason. However, RoJo offers double-digit touches at a rock-bottom price. Folks will be scared off by the 1.6 DK in the NFC title game but he did have 10 carries. That’s in line with the 13 he got in the previous week as well. Since the Chiefs struggled against the run with the 31st ranked DVOA, this is a very solid spot. I don’t love the fact that Jones is not involved in the passing game. Fournette has racked up 17 targets over the postseason run to just one for Jones. Still, the price difference is undeniable. In the first matchup, Jones took 10 touches and turned it into 17.3 DK with over 100 scrimmage yards and a score. Don’t expect that but RoJo stands to be the most attractive punt right now.
Fournette is the “better” choice in the Super Bowl Game Breakdown because if the Bucs have to abandon the run, he’s going to get the passing work. You could take the path of playing Chiefs pass game+Fournette and either Evans or Godwin without Brady. If you threw Jones and Fournette together, you lock up all the backfield touches for the Bucs at under $10,000 and have some wiggle room left to play with. Either way, Jones looks like a key way to mix in a punt with some serious upside in this game.
WR – Mike Evans has been super quiet the past two weeks, but consider who he’s faced. Marshon Lattimore always gives him fits and Jaire Alexander never really left him after a big touchdown grab early in the game. If folks want to overlook Evans, that’s fine by me. Bashaud Breeland has had a very solid season for the Chiefs, allowing just a 1.40 P/PT and a 50.8% completion rate (third-best). He’s also giving about six inches and 35 pounds to Evans, a major physical mismatch. Brady loves him in the RZ and EZ, where he racked up 18 and 14 targets respectively.
Corner L’Jarius Sneed really played well for the Chiefs when he was active since he played just nine games. He’s lined up in the slot and only allowed a 52.3% catch rate and a 1.30 P/PT on the season across 44 targets. They could elect to use Sneed on Chris Godwin or possibly Tyrann Mathieu, who played some slot as well. Either way, the road is a tough on for Godwin. It’s not like Antonio Brown has a cakewalk either. He gets Charvarius Ward for a good chunk of the game. Ward was targeted 67 times and allowed a 1.80 P/PT. While it’s the “easiest” matchup on the board, AB has only been targeted six times total in two playoff games. He’s not even all that cheap at $6,200. I’d rather play one of Evans or Godwin even at the salary.
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TE – If you’re playing a tight end, Cameron Brate looks like he’s going to be the safest bet and there is upside here too. Even Dawson Knox of the Bills posted 15+ DK points, and KC struggled against the tight ends all year. They allowed the seventh-most DK points, fifth-most yards, and nine touchdowns. Brate has been the pass catcher in the playoffs with 16 total targets and never scoring below nine DK points. Compare that to Rob Gronkowski who has been targeted seven times and has two games of just one target. If the game goes high-scoring as projected, Brate is a very solid way to get exposure to the Tampa pass game.
D/ST – I was prepared to be willing to play them, but they are more expensive than the Chiefs. Kansas City could have a major weakness with the loss of tackle Eric Fisher. It’s hard to really quantify that because it happened so late in the Buffalo game. One thing the Bucs do extremely well is get pressure at the third-highest rate in football, 27.9%. I have to believe that the Chiefs will have an answer for that and I’m not overly concerned with it. If playing a defense, I’d be much heavier on the Chiefs.
Captain Pool – Kelce, Hill, Fournette, Evans, Godwin, Brate
Thank you for reading Super Bowl Game Breakdown! Make sure you follow me on Twitter at @bucn4life and be sure to sign up for an ALL ACCESS GOLD ACCOUNT account here at Win Daily Sports. Gain access to our Projection Models and jump into our Discord where we will have our experts talking plays across every sport and slate!

Contributors: u/WhymEYEhere u/gadzooooooks u/knucklefang u/sicuho u/pidgewiffler u/Whiskeypixie24 u/inkwell13 u/theintervet u/acemccrank u/mark_das_stoner u/emmittthenervend u/im_back u/craterfist u/Quibblicous u/pandabear905 u/FatherAzerun u/purplekiwi u/raykendo u/evankh u/myeviltwin47 u/thegreeklettertau u/snarkywombat u/dmcdoogs u/makoto20 u/thedrunkenmagi u/anselhelm u/bbbebbb

1. Violin of Silence: This violin is made of a very expensive wood and has a horse hair bow string. The violin makes no sound, not even when dropped or smashed.
   
2. Blindfold of Sight: A black cloth blindfold that when attuned to allows the wearer to have an extra 30 feet of darkvision while their eyes are covered by it.
   
3. Necklace of Repulsion: An ornate silver necklace that once attuned to forces the creature to make an intelligence saving throw of 19. On a failed save they feel an intense urge to unattune to the necklace.
   
   1. Ghostly Dice: A pair of red six sided die that once rolled continue to roll until something stops them.
4. Torriens Ring: A blue ring that once attuned to changes color to be either red or green.
   
5. Mirror of The Ghast: A large mirror that does not show the reflection of living creatures. The effects of this mirror do not work on creatures who are immune to poison or are elven.
   
6. Prototype Swords of Vision: A collection of swords ranging from greatswords to rapiers that once attuned to allows the creature to be colorblind for an hour. This ability can be used once per long rest.
   
7. Zeki’s Box of Water: A rusty copper box with small dents scattered around it. The box is always full of illusionary water. When the water hits an object other than the box it disappears.
   
8. Book of Reading: A large tome with a velvet cover. If a creature can read the book fully then they gain the ability to read.
   
9. Philosophers Stone: A jade stone the size of a halflings palm with a number carved into it. Each dawn the number changes between one to one hundred.
   
10. Shoes of Planned Obsolescence: Leather shoes that look very plain. The shoes take twice the amount of wear and tear as regular shoes.
    
11. Ring of Detect Magic: This unassuming metal band glows blue when there is magic nearby. However, since it itself is a magic item, it is always glowing blue.
    
12. Wand of Smelling: Touch any moveable object with this wand. If the wand likes the smell, it will glow green...if it does not like the smell it glows red...if it can't decide, it glows blue. The glow fades after 6 seconds.
    
13. Jumpsuit of Teleportation: This stylish, full-body jumpsuit can only be activated when worn by itself due to weight limitations. When activated, the suit will be teleported to the desired location, but not the character wearing it.
    
14. Journal of Stubbornness: A small empty journal that looks completely normal to everyday people except the pages cannot be written in.
    
15. Crown of Arcane Harmony: A golden crown with many colorful and expensive jewels on it. once attuned to the crown, a creature has learned to master the process of attunement. The maximum ammount of magic item it can attune to is increased by one.
    
16. Bagpipes of Invisibility: For as long as you play these bagpipes, you are invisible. You are, however, incredibly audible even when in magical silence.
    
17. Weather Detecting Stone: A small flat stone perfect for skipping across a pond. If this stone is wet, it is raining. If it is warm, it is sunny. If it is white, it's snowing. Requires access to the open sky to function.
    
18. Wand of Lightening Bolts: Bane of tailors everywhere, you may target a fabric object within 60 feet with this wand, causing its color to fade by several degrees.
    
19. Ring of Invisibleness: A platinum band ring. The ring is invisible when worn.
    
20. The Compass of The North: This copper compass points towards whatever you tell it to find, as long as it is north of you. When it is not in use or cannot find an object due to it not being north of the compass, the compass defaults to pointing north.
    
21. Oversized Cloak: A black cloak with giant runes transcribed inside of it. When attuned, the cloak resizes to your form, though slightly too large.
    
22. Skeleton Repellent: A clear perfume bottle with cleanish yellow liquid that contains 1d4 uses. This spray on works on the creature that uses it. A spray from this can forces the user's skeleton to escape into the ethereal plane for 1d6 hours. During this time, the creature can still breath, speak, and drink as normal. However, the creature's movement is reduced to 0 and cannot make a melee attack or cast a spell that requires movement. If this spray is used on a creature other than the one spraying it, it has no effect.
    
23. Toering of Lockpicking: This must be worn around the toe, and gives advantage when using Thieves Tools with your feet.
    
24. Ring of Undoing: This ring undoes the last action taken by the wearer, which is to put on the Ring of Undoing.
    
25. Bag of Dropping: This bag functions as a small portal to an extradimensional space. Any number of items may be placed in the bag up to a storage capacity of 64 cubic feet. All items placed in the bag are lost in the Astral Sea and replace with an equivalent amount of manure, buffalo chips, or guano.
    
26. Prototype Cloak of Hugs: This furry cloak should sense when you need a hug, and gives you the right squeeze at the right time. Unfortunately it always squeezes too tight.
    
27. Wand of Witch Slaying: A black oak wand that can cast power word kill as a cantrip. The wand does not work if there isn’t a full moon, if the target isn’t a witch, if the user is an elf, goliath, or orc, if the user is taller than 6’1 or smaller than 5’11, if the user didn’t eat a breakfast worth 7 silver pieces that morning, if the user or target was born in cold weather, if it’s summer, if the user ate corn that week, if the user doesn’t have a pet rat, and if the user is older than 21. The DC for the spell is a constitution save of 3.
    
28. Amulet of Immortality: A silver amulet with a small diamond. While a creature is wearing the amulet they can use an action to cast revivify on themselves as an action. The creature must have at least five hit points to use the Amulet of Immortality
    
29. Ring of Fire Detection: A red band ring with a ruby. The ring glows upon touch with fire.
    
30. Cloak of Cold Detection: a blue and gold cloak that shivers when it gets cold.
    
31. Shirt of Abjuration: This white common cloth shirt cannot be affected by cantrips. While the wearer is still hurt by damage caused by cantrips the shirt does not. This includes cantrips like prestidigitation or mending.
    
32. Pants of Abjuration: This pair of jeans cannot be affected by cantrips. While the wearer is still hurt by damage caused by cantrips the shirt does not. This includes cantrips like prestidigitation or mending.
    
33. Pocket Watch of The Far Realm: This blue pocket Watch with a silver chain always tells the accurate time of the entire plane of the far realm. The far realm is a place beyond space and time. The pocket watches hands move fast and sporadically, sometimes even gaining a third and fourth hand.
    
34. The Flip Coin: A gold coin magically imbued with graviturgy that, when flipped to make a decision, always lands on its edge.
    
35. Cursed Amulet: When worn it sings the most annoying theme song it came up with for the party. Taking it off does not stop the song.
    
36. Wand of Antimagic: A wand with burn marks at the tip from when it was struck by lightning. The wand allows the spellcaster to use their bonus action to counterspell their own spell.
    
37. Wings of Flight: A cloak that is either black or white. When activated, the black cloak turns into a pair of giant bat wings; the white turns into a pair of angel wings. They then immediately detach from the wearer’s back and fly away.
    
38. Hammer of Efficient Lock Picking: When struck forcefully against a simple lock of standard materials for an hour, the lock will magically break apart. Generally, the lock is broken long before the function triggers.
    
39. Crystal Wine Glass of Returning: When thrown, this delicate and intricate wineglass will return to the holders hand by the end of the round after being thrown. Sadly, the glass is extraordinarily fragile and even a strike against the lightest surface could shatter it, with unfortunate consequences upon returning if the thrower is not wearing gauntlets.
    
40. Hammer of Singing: When this xylophone hammer strikes any key on a xylophone, the sound emanates from the hammer and not the xylophone.
    
41. Comb of The Frostmaiden: Despite it’s name, any gender may wear this ornate almost tiara-like comb in their hair. When donned, the comb grants the character the ability to shed dandruff once per round.
    
42. Sky Stone: A smooth pebble that weighs negative five pounds. If not held down, it will fall upward and disappear into the sky.
    
43. Dimension Window: A framed "painting" that displays an alien landscape, complete with motion and sound. There is no way to enter the painting and no way to scry what region it is displaying, if it is even a real place.
    
44. Glove of Offense: A single leather glove. When the hand wearing this glove is used to make an attack, a voice coming from the glove yells an offensive joke or insult directed at the target.
    
45. Joke Deck: On casual observation, it appears to be an ordinary complete deck. If the deck is drawn from, the card will always be a card normally not found in the deck. (an 11 of Spades, a Purple Joker, etc.)
    
46. Dandruff of Vecna: A bag of skin flakes that magically replenishes at 1d4 cubic inches per day. The flakes have an odd mildewey flavor.
    
47. Dracomyres Squid: a miniature stone squid statue with sapphires for eyes. The squid does not descend from gravity. If one tries to drop the statue it will stay in the air until another creature takes it. When thrown the statue has a constant height but slows down faster than most objects its size until it stops in midair.
    
48. Mask of Fame: A completely white mask that when worn displays the wearer’s name in gold letters on the masks forehead.
    
49. Shoes of Comedy: A pair of jester shoes with bells attached to the top of each toe. The bells sound like laughter when they jingle. When the person wearing the shoes makes a joke the shoes become quiet for 1d4 turns.
    
50. Carpet of Filth: A beige carpet that is very hard to clean. The Carpet of Filth takes twice as long to clean and when a stain is added there’s a 10% chance it cannot be removed without magical means.
    
51. Bracelet of The Occult: A black metal bracelet with etchings of demons and devils on it. When a creatures blood goes through the bracelet it becomes black for one hour. The bracelet is for evil rituals but even the cult that uses it knows it’s only for effects and their rituals don’t need the bracelet at all to work.
    
52. Cicero’s Stopwatch: A magical clock made of gold with a red button on its side. When the button is pressed all time is stopped for 1d100 turns for everything including the creature using the stopwatch. When time is stopped nothing can move and when time continues it continues as if nothing happened.
    
53. Monocle of Illusion: A golden monocle with a near indestructible lens that makes the wearer’s vision in both eyes blurry when worn.
    
54. Bottle of The Hunter: A green bottle that has a note inside with instructions on how to use it. When the bottle is spun it will always point to the nearest humanoid creature. The nearest humanoid creature is always going to be the one who spun the bottle. If the spinner moves from the bottle it will continue spinning until it’s stopped.
    
55. Ring of The Dark Curse: A silver band with a black diamond that once attuned to cursed the wearer. The attuned gets a -4 to all stats has disadvantage on all rolls. The curse can only be lifted by having the wearer no longer wish to be cursed.
    
56. Meltable Wood: Meltable Wood as the name suggests is wood that melts at high temperatures. Meltable Wood comes in oak, cyprus, redwood, and cedar.
    
57. Chessboard of Anger: A normal looking chessboard that when two people start playing a d10 is rolled. The number rolled on the d10 is how many turns each player gets before the board magically flips over causing the pieces to go flying.
    
58. Chair of Torment: A wooden rocking chair that magically feels uncomfortable. The chair was made by an angry carpenter as revenge to a farmer that gave him overpriced cabbage.
    
59. Water Powered Piano: A grand piano with no strings. The piano can play magically without them. The piano can only be played when a gallon of water is poured into the piano. For every gallon put in the piano is one hour that the piano can be played.
    
60. Psychic Vase: An orange vase that can telepathically speak to creatures within 30 feet of it. The vase only tells creatures “I can speak by thinking to you. Good morning”.
    
61. Tyresian’s Contraption: A strange looking machine that has the shape of a typewriter with a small indent and a small thin slot. The machine is supposed to have a creature out their thumb in the small indent and a paper would come out of the thin slot accurately predicting their full name. The machine actually has a blank paper come out of the thin slot.
    
62. Tough Butter: A stick of butter that when put in water becomes tougher than steel. The butter returns to normal when it is dried.
    
63. Scroll of Page Armor: When this scroll is activated, the caster becomes entirely immune to papercuts, dry rot, and having to carry documents for legislators.
    
64. Ring of Warning: The ring sometimes glows bright blue, at intervals with no discernible pattern or cause. When it is glowing, it has the effect of the light cantrip.
    
65. Bag of Golding: Any item placed inside the bag is instantly turned into solid gold. It reverts to its original form immediately when it is removed.
    
66. Bowl of Drinking: A small wooden bowl that is sentient and has 1 intelligence, 1 wisdom, and 1 charisma. When water is put into the bowl it will mysteriously begin to disappear over the course of 1 minute if the bowl is full. This is because the bowl will drink any water that’s put inside of it. If the bowl drinks too much water it will die and become a mundane wooden bowl.
    
67. Ring of Dreaming Telepathy: The wearer can read other people’s thoughts, only the thoughts come to the wearer as dreams, when they’re asleep and they can’t recall the dreams when they wake up.
    
68. Calendar note: A yellow square note that tells you what day it is, every day, with the message "It is today" written upon it. If something is written on this note, it will be replaced by "It is today".
    
69. Wand of Create Wand of Create Wand: A simple looking wand with a single charge. When used, the wand disintegrates but an identical wand appears at the users feet.
    
70. Poison of Health: This yellow poison is made from repurposed health potions. A creature subjected to this poison regains any hit points lost from the inflicting attack.
    
71. Mages Wagon Wheel: A tiny lightweight wheel that can be controlled with a mini wand that comes in many colors. The wand has a ten foot range. the wheel is easily breakable. A great gift for the kids on the holidays.
    
72. Forever Cleaning Broom: This broom detects dirt on the floor and sweeps it up into a pile. It the detects dirt in a pile and spreads it out across the floor. This repeats until someone cleans the dirt themself.
    
73. Attunement Statue: This small handheld statue depicts a person in meditation. Once attuned, the face of the statue animates and informs the user that they are attuned to it, then deanimates.
    
74. Monogamous Pillow: Only the person attuned to this pillow can fall asleep while resting on it. Anyone else attempting to rest on it will stay awake until they attune to it.
    
75. The Orb Of Perfect Hindsight: This magical orb watches each action taken by the individual who has it in their possession. When the individual does something stupid, especially something that hurts them, it proceeds to tell the individual at length why they shouldn't have done that. The orb speaks in the individual's native tongue and uses a parental, judging tone.
    
76. Artificers Hat: A stylish black top hat that when attuned to makes the wearer feel heavier. The wearer’s weight does not change. This hat was the first magical item made by a powerful artificer. While it isn’t worth much it’s held very dear to its creator.
    
77. Jar of Red Dye: A mason jar that turns liquids red when put in and shaken for a minute.
    
78. Jar of Blue Dye: A mason jar that turns liquids blue when put in and shaken for a minute.
    
79. Jar of Green Dye: A mason jar that turns liquids green when put in and shaken for a minute.
    
80. Cloak of Skin: A cloak that looks like it’s made of human skin. When worn by a creature the cloak transmutates itself into being made out of the wearer’s skin.
    
81. Prototype Socks of Pleasant Smells: A pair of white socks with a thin red line going horizontally around the ankle. The socks always smell like burnt French fries.
    
82. Tome of Minor Teleportation: A large book with a black cover that once attuned to allows the owner to teleport at will. The teleportation has a range of 3 inches and requires the the owner not to be restrained or grappled. The Tome does not work while wearing metal.
    
83. Ring of Surging Action: A golden ring with a ruby that has the soul of a brave warrior inside of it. While wearing the ring the wearer can use an action to use action surge once on every turn.
    
84. Wallet of Teeth: A black leather wallet that has 2d6 teeth inside of it. The teeth reappear at dawn if removed. The teeth are not sharp and are loose in the wallet.
    
85. Wig of Movement: An unkempt grey wig made of rat fur that will at random moments fly off of the wearer’s head and land anywhere from 5 to 40 feet away from them.
    
86. Prototype Crystal Ball: A crystal ball that when looked into by a creature that has a 3rd level spell slot can show the immediate future of a random creature. The creature can be from any plane and it only shows up to a half a minute into their future.
    
87. Orb of Hurt: This purple magic orb causes pain when dropped on ones foot. However it causes no pain when being used intentionally to cause pain.
    
88. Magic Cat Statue: A small marble statue of a cat that has a large gold coin it’s holding. When placing the cat on a desk, bed, counter, etc, all objects that weigh less than 10 pounds are flung onto the floor when nobody is looking.
    
89. Wizards Pinecone: A seemingly normal pinecone that when held shrinks to half its original size, then grows twice its original size, and continues to do so until put down.
    
90. Staff of Ducks: A thick staff with vines wrapped around it. When a caster expends a spell slot to cast any spell 1d4 illusionary ducks will be summoned and waddle away. The ducks disappear after a minute.
    
91. Ball of Sadness: A small yellow rubber ball with a red circle on it that cannot bounce. It was made by an angry old witch to trick kids with. She would tell the kids the ball only bounces for people who have parents that love them. It was a very effective way for her to get the tears of children needed for her youth cream.
    
92. Crown of The Underdark Mage: A purple crown with amethysts that once attuned to causes the wearer’s skin to turn purple. The effects last as long as the crown is worn.
    
93. Jewel of Vision: A diamond that when looked into slows the user to see through glass.
    
94. Mattress of Earthquakes: A beige queen sized mattress that, at random points of the night, shakes violently.
    
95. Potion of Dry Skin: A thin white liquid that sucks the moisture out of a creatures skin when drinking it. The potions effects are removed when the creature soaks in warm or cold water for 15 minutes.
    
96. Oven Mitts of Heat Conduction: A pair of black oven mitts that magically transfer heat that it touches through the glove. The creator of these oven mitts has burn scars still on his hands to this day that he refuses to talk about.
    
97. Mutators Door: A door that changes the type of wood it’s made out of when something knocks on it.
    
98. Water of The Drunkard: A bottle of wine that tastes like water. This wine was a failed attempt at making the first magically infused wine.
    
99. Wallace’s and Loki’s Weapons of Ash: Weapons that we’re made by Loki, a notoriously powerful cleric of trickery and Wallace, an artificer and good friend of Loki. The weapons of ash range from long swords, greatswords, maces, whips, arrows, longbows, warhammers, etc. The weapons are made to look like masterfully crafted weapons. Each weapon has a +3 to hit but once a weapon hits a target it immediately turns to ash.
    

I was signing autographs in a downtown Richmond book boutique when Henry came in. I had been there for over four hours, sitting at a folding table scribbling my name on the inside covers of endless copies of Night Terrors, and was exhausted. My arm ached and my head throbbed. Meeting a perpetual flow of fans, many of them gushing, is hell to me. Don’t get me wrong, I love them dearly, but social situations tend to repel me, and actually engaging people I don’t know is an awkward near impossibility.
It was nearing one, dark and nasty without, and I was longing for a nice long nap in my hotel room when Henry’s turn came. I thought that the woman before him, a middle-aged blond in a brown leather jacket, would never leave. But thankfully Mr. Preston, the owner of the shop, ushered her away in his prissy manner.
I smiled at the man whom I did not recognize as Henry. He was tall and pale, his wavy black hair limp and lusterless, the flesh of his face tight and his eyes an unhealthy pink which bespoke sleepless nights. He smiled wearily yet warmly.
Without a word he passed me his copy of Night Terrors. “And how are you today?” I asked as I sat the book down, my blue Sharpie pen, the second one of the day, poised.
“Just peachy,” he croaked, and I at once knew the voice. I looked up, and Henry was still grinning as if through pain.
“Henry!” I cried happily, and extended my hand. He took it, and it was like a block of ice.
I and Henry were like brothers since time out of mind; our parents were high school friends who lived next to each other in the Pickett subdivision on Thomas Street, and from diapers we were always together, on play dates, camping trips, and backyard pool parties. We were inseparable all through our school years, and only parted, tearfully and grudgingly, when I left Picketts Meade to study at UVA in 1997. Since then, we had seen very little of each other, as I lived mostly in New York City and he in the house willed to him by his childless aunt and uncle.
“Hey, man,” he said, “what’s goin on?”
“Not much,” I said, “same old stuff. Working and all that. What about you?”
He shrugged. “Same here, pretty much. Listen, are you free this afternoon?”
“Sure, what’s up?”
“I got a ghost,” he said, as though the words were kidney stones.
“Sure, I’d be happy to come by.”
Henry smiled again. “Thanks. You know where my aunt’s old place is, right?”
“Ahhh, no, I forgot.”
“Okay, here.” Henry pulled out his wallet and opened it. In the translucent slot where preening fathers proudly put pictures of their children, there was a faded Polaroid of two boys, one tall and skinny, the other short and fat, at a lake on a summer day in 1988, mugging it up with their arms thrown around the other’s shoulder. I had the same one in my wallet.
Henry produced a small piece of creased paper and, with my pen, jotted down the directions.
“I’ll be there at around four or so,” I said, sticking the paper into my blazer’s breast pocket.
“Thanks a million, man, I can’t tell you the kinda shit I been goin through.”
“I can imagine.”
“Good book; is it number one?”
I snickered. “Ahead of Glenn Beck? I wish.”
Henry shrugged. “Still a classic. I can’t believe some of the shit. All of it’s real?”
“As you and I,” I replied. I jotted down my name and a small, personal message onto the inside cover, and handed it back to Henry.
“I’ll see you,” he said. “I’ll be there,” I responded with a smile.
***
Almost two hours later I left the bookstore by the back door, emerged into a narrow ally of grimy brick walls, and carefully crept toward busy 5thstreet. Above, the sky was malevolently silent.
Before leaving the relative safety of the alley, I looked both ways along the sidewalk, and found it empty save for several rushing, bundled forms. For a moment I was reminded of those old shots of The Beatles running from mad throngs of screaming women through the streets of London, and smiled.
I stepped into a freezing gust and hurried up the sidewalk, passing drab storefronts darkened by the gloomy afternoon light. A Ford Focus passed by on the street in a splash of puddled rain, its red taillights glowing satanically in the mist.
Ahead, a brave hotdog vendor, possibly a transplanted New Yorker, stood tensely behind his cart, ready to feed the world. He offered me a taste of his wares, and the almost desperate imploring of his voice touched me. Imagining poverty and mounting bills, I bought a small fountain Coke even though I wasn’t thirsty, and almost as soon as I was out of sight I cast the cup into a metal trash bin, the clanking ice cubes within having sapped the heat from my hand.
Slowly the scenery bled into one of the residential. Dirty Brownstone tenements marched dismally into the ashen day, their crumbling stoops guarded by rusted metal sentries overflowing with rank refuse.
I finally came to the small lot where I had left my Jeep in-between a pick-up truck and a hatchback. The latter was gone, replaced by a small red Beetle. I fished the keys from my pocket and opened the driver side door.
Behind the wheel, I started the engine and the radio came to life with one bland Taylor Swift song or another. Before leaving I slipped Krokus’ Change of Address into the CD player, and slowly cruised back the way I had come.
Several minutes later I took a sloping onramp and met the babbling interstate; before I joined the flow I waited for several large Mac trucks to scream by in their shrouds of water mist. The meager Richmond skyline stretched away to the east, interrupted only by the wide river which bisects the city. Maybe it was the mood and light of the afternoon, but the city seemed a deserted necropolis, the buildings bizarre Druid ruins rising black against the sky.
Once on the interstate I noticed that several idiots cars next to mine were busy blabbering into their cell-phones or texting. I’m not the kind of guy who wants to ban this and that, or the kind of asshole who preaches his opinion to everybody, but I know what can happen on a freeway when someone wants to whip out the old Droid and chat.
One girl, with wet black hair and dressed in a loose white t-shirt, flipped me off when I motioned hang up and drive.
Women, I thought with a grin, they taste good…but the heartburn!
I soon took rural Exit 154 and coasted into the parking lot of a small roadside gas station fed by a narrow hillside lane. I pulled under the gas-pump shelter and killed Marc Storace in the middle of Burning up the Night. I searched my hip pocket and checked the directions again. The name of the town was Fairfield, not too far north of the city.
I got out into the damp and filled the jeep up with juice, wincing at the price. With that done, I crossed the open space between the pumps and the store, my hair dampening, and entered.
After waiting for a white man in a mossy oak camo cap to buy a six pack of Bud Ice and a black woman to purchase a pack of condoms and tampons (an ungodly mix, if you ask me), it came my turn. The wispy old man behind the counter, wearing country regulation suspenders over his button up work shirt, studied me for a long moment.
“Hey, you’re that writer fella, aintcha?” he asked with a rough smile, revealing that his teeth were mostly black or tarnished gold.
Despite a swelling of pride in my chest, I wanted desperately to avoid an embarrassing scene.
“No.”
“Hm. You look a lot like ‘im. She loves all that damn ghost huntin’ garbage.”
I paid for the gas, and the old man wished me a good afternoon with a crooked grin.
Once back in my car, I again studied the directions, trying to absorb them so that I wouldn’t have to constantly consult them in transit.
Feeling confident that I could make it on my own, I started up the engine and followed the ascending byway toward Fairfield.
I soon left behind all urban pretense and found myself speeding through low hills and tiny hamlets made up of slanted wood structures decades past their prime. It had begun to rain more steadily. Crossing the murky Roman River, I saw that it had overflowed its banks.
The winding lane took me past yet more hilly farmland enclosed by strands of barbed wire, putting me slightly in mind of northern England. When I came to the outer limits of Fairfield, which sat across another, smaller, swollen river, I was greeted by a white board sign proclaiming it as The Nicest Town in America.
Main Street, lined with gray brick shops dating from the 1920s, sank down into the rest of the town, from which a white church spire rose into the air, and a blue water tower next to a tall brick schoolhouse loomed supernaturally forth from the thick valley mist. The sidewalk boasted fiery trees, the embers of which carpeted the wet concrete.
At the four-way intersection, the only cars that I met were a station wagon going to the east part of town, a minivan heading back the way I had come, and an SUV going down into the heart of the town, which lied spread before the hill like a fog enshrouded dream.
I took the left and followed the street for a time, passing a small doctor’s office and the police station. The big roll-top doors of the local volunteer fire department were open, and I glimpsed several men in the gloom lazily wiping down the sleeping green dragon within. A group of children struggled down the sidewalk with crammed backpacks dragging along the wet pavement. A boy on a ten-speed bike shot past them and hung a sharp right, taking a small dead-end road ending at the foot of the hill. In the rear view mirror a large yellow school grinded to a halt, the red lights on its mounted stop sign blinking rhythmically. Teenagers tumbled out and hurried across.
Lee Street was an odd mix of ranch and Victorian houses, all beautiful and tastefully enclosed by hedges or withering gardens. A few of the larger homes were sectioned off with low stone walls waist high to a man.
The last house on the left was tall and narrow, dating back at least to the latter half of the 1890s. With spires and gingerbread trim it affected a stately air.
I parked along the street and sat for a moment, memories washing over me. I and Henry had come here several summers during our childhood. Being unable to have children, Jo and Oscar doted on us so much it was almost cloying. They were rabid antique collectors, and spent thirty happy years hoarding history together before Flight 93 went down over Pennsylvania on the eleventh of September, 2001.
I killed the engine and got out into a brisk slap of wind. After waiting for a minivan to swoosh past, I crossed the street. The grass along the flagstone walk was encroachingly tall, and I wondered if Henry’s ghost had hidden his lawnmower.
I bounded up the porch and knocked on the door. I waited in the cold for a moment, a wind from the west raking my flesh. Finally, as I cocked my fist to knock again, the door opened, and was filled with Henry, dressed as he had been at the bookstore.
“Hey, man” he greeted and moved aside.
“Long time no see,” I smiled. Stepping across the threshold, I was immediately struck by the heaviness of the atmosphere, crushing down on me like the world upon Atlas’s shoulders. I staggered, and Henry at one grabbed my arm and helped steady me.
“Uh-oh,” he said, “I don’t like that.”
“I’m fine,” I lied, looking suspiciously about myself, “just tired.” I didn’t at once remember what such a black heft meant, but I did know that it wasn’t good. At all.
“Well, if you wanna go back…”
“Nah,” I dismissed, “I’m alright.”
“Okay,” Henry said and led me from the shadowy foyer and into a wide parlor. A large bay window, an ugly modern addition, sat across the room, uncurtained. Save for tall, dusty bookshelves along either wall, the only other furnishings in the room were a couch piled with tangled blankets and a pillow, and two armchairs.
Henry showed me to one of the chairs and took the one across from me.
“So, what’s up? How’s life treating you?”
I sighed. “Alright. I hate the touring, though. I can’t stand being on the road.”
“Ah,” he dismissed me with a wave of the hand, “you always were a little homebody. I love the open road. Nothing like it. You want a drink?”
I nodded.
“Coke,” he warned me.
“Better be.”
He laughed and moved off to the kitchen, leaving me alone in the room. The dark feeling pressed down on me harder than it had been, compressing my chest. I tried to take a deep breath, but was unable. It was like standing on a high butte overlooking a strange plain in a dark world, the air thin and sour.
Henry returned with two Cokes. He handed me one and sat back down. “Sorry they’re not cold. I just bought ‘em on the way back.”
“That’s fine,” I said, opening mine and taking a long drink. Henry sat his between his legs.
“I saw you on Ghost Hunters last month,” he said with something like pride, “I was over at my old girlfriend’s house and when your mug popped out, I about went crazy. “Hey, I know that guy!””
My appearance on the popular SYFY Channel show had been little more than a publicity stunt engineered by my agent. I was against it from the first, but ending up going on anyway. The target was a 13th Century castle on an Irish bluff overlooking the crashing sea. Supposedly, a family of werewolves had lived there in the sixteen hundreds.
“They’re a sham,” I said, glancing around as if expecting a hostile apparition to materialize. Maybe I was.
“Who?”
“Those attention whores,” I said, referring to the ‘ghost hunters’. “There weren’t any ghosts. It was all faked. The noises. The mist. All of it.
“I figured,” Henry said, “they usually are.”
“I guess,” I looked around.
“Yeah.” Henry finished off his Coke and sat the empty can at his foot.
“So, what have you been doing?” I asked, “just hanging out?”
“Yeah,” he said, “aunt Jo and uncle Oscar weren’t rich. They had money, but not much. The way the recession’s going, I’m probably gonna have to go back to work soon.”
“Sometimes I wish I could just stop writing and investigating and all that and just live off my books’ proceeds,” I confided, “live the life without doing the work.”
Henry chuckled. “You’re lucky; you got a kick-ass job. I’m most likely gonna end up at Food-Lion or something.”
“Gotta start somewhere,” I said. “Maybe we can write a novel together.”
Both of us had tried as children to write our own horror stories. Henry’s were mostly better than mine.
“Maybe,” he seemed to taste the idea.
I opened my mouth to reply, but a stiff gust of wind slammed into the house, and I jolted.
Henry laughed. “Scared?”
I shook my head. “No, not really. I just…well, what exactly are we dealing with, here?”
Henry sobered, his face darkening. “I…I been thinking how to word this for a while now.” He paused. “You ever hear that phrase La petite mort?”
I missed a beat. “What?”
“You know, that French metaphor? It refers to a state of euphoria after you “finish.””
“Yeah, I know.”
Henry sat grasping for a moment. “People believe that some kind of spiritual lifeforce is…expelled when you cum. Somehow that’s like dying or something.”
“Uh-huh,” I nodded awkwardly.
“And in Ghosts and Ghouls, you said that some people think a ghost is just…leftover human energy. Right?”
“The atheists and agnostics in the field, yes.”
“Do you think it’s possible that…that release of energy can leave a…a ghostly residue?”
I laughed. “Henry, that’s just a metaphor; it doesn’t mean anything.”
“Are you sure?”
I opened my mouth, but closed it again. I couldn’t honestly say that I was.
“What…what makes you ask that?”
“It’s my bed,” he replied darkly.
“Your bed?”
He nodded. “Remember Sarah Kerns?”
For a moment I drew a blank, and then an angular face framed in raven hair materialized before my mind’s eye.
“Sure,” I said, “your girlfriend in eighth grade. What about her?”
“Remember how she moved over the summer, before we started high school?”
I nodded. Her father was in some kind of business that forced him to relocate often. I can’t remember what it was, though.
“The night before she left, she came over to my house and we did it...”
“Alright,” I urged, and then it dawned on me. “You still have the same bed, don’t you?”
He shrugged. “Never saw a good reason to get rid of it.”
“And you’ve…done a lot in it, huh?”
“A lot,” he admitted.
“And now you think…what, all that combined energy has created a sort of ghost?”
“Look, I know it’s crazy, but just hear me out, okay?”
“Okay.”
Henry took a deep breath and began.
Several weeks before crying out to me for help, he told me, he had been lying awake in bed. It was a windy night and he was as far from sleep as a man can get, so, as he watched the darkened ceiling, he let his mind drift unfettered. He had always had a fertile imagination, and was entertaining himself with undisclosed fantasies when, all of a sudden, the foot of the bed lurched to one side, as though booted by an angry WWE star after an in-ring betrayal.
“Man, that scared the shit outta me,” Henry said. “I froze up and just laid there for a minute. Then it happened again, and this time I got knocked off.”
Frightened, Henry jumped up, fell in the sheets tangled at his feet, and flew down the stairs.
“I sat here in the living room for a little while. After a half hour or so, I decided it was a nightmare and went back up. In the room, I flipped on the light switch and…”
He was quiet for a long moment, looking down at his ashen hands. “And there was a fuckin dead girl spread out on the bed, covered in blood and shit.”
I gasped softly at this, my heart freezing in mid beat.
“You’re sure?” I asked incredulously.
He nodded without looking up. “Yeah. And she looked like Hanna Giles…you remember her, right?”
I did. She was a cheerleader during school, a tall drink of blond perfection. She and Henry spent much of the 11th grade getting hot and heavy together before he grew bored and found another conquest.
“And…and she…sat up, her fuckin eyes were black and she had these long Dracula fangs. She opened up her legs and…fucking blood gushed out.”
He stopped at my hiss of horror. “It looked like…you know, in The Shinning, when that elevator opens up in the beginning?”
I nodded, my mouth slightly agape.
“I saw that shit and lost my mind. I ran out the front door and down the street. Spent the rest of the night in a booth at the diner, too afraid to come home.”
In the morning, Henry stretched out in the parlor.
“I was having dinner the next day. A buffalo chicken Hungry Man. So, I was sitting at the kitchen table eating, when something above my head, in the room, crashed against the floor. And right after, I heard this long, high pitched laugh.”
Stiff with terror, Henry remained unmoving at the table for nearly an hour before packing up and going to a motel for a few days.
“I was starting to think it was a nightmare, but when that shit happened…”
Henry eventually returned, convinced that the “ghosts”, while frightening, were harmless.
“So, one night, I got brave and went back upstairs to see what would happen.”
After several uneventful hours, Henry was on the border of sleep when something, something cold and dry, wrapped around his throat.
“It felt like hands, little…you know, a woman’s hands.”
The world grayed as Henry clawned at the phantom hands to no avail. He nearly collapsed into death before they suddenly and inexplicably spared him.
“That was the other night. I was about to leave, go get a motel or something, but I heard you were coming down, so I thought I’d see if you could help me.”
For a long moment I sat in brooding silence.
In 1999, I left school to work for a noted regional paranormal researcher named John Haggis. I accompanied him on many outings, most of them busts. Only three confirmed cases of the genuinely supernatural came across our desk in the three years I worked with him, one of them being the demonic haunting of a bar in Headwaters, a tiny hamlet nestled in the Shenandoah foothills southwest of Harrisonburg.
I learned several things from our experience there. One: Demons despise the presence of a professional. Two: While ghosts can, on extremely rare occasions, possess human beings, only demons can shapeshift and actually harm someone without the use of a human agent.
“Have…have you ever smelled sulfur here?” I asked, my voice natural, at least to my own ears.
“Rotten eggs? No, why?”
“You’ve been left alone outside the room, right?”
“Yeah. What about the sulfur?” he seemed impatient.
I ignored him and looked from one shadowy corner to another, the house bathed in a sour, uneasy silence. I was shocked to find myself wanting to get as away from the house as I could.
“Henry,” I drew, my eyes darting apprehensively, “there…”
I stopped. How would he take hearing that a demon was in his house? But was it really a demon we were dealing with? I couldn’t be sure; I’m not, after all, a demonologist.
“What?” he asked, his tone low and worried.
If it was, then it appeared to be attached to the bed somehow, like a ghost to a favorite rocking chair…
“…I doubt that your ghost is made of girl goo.” I at length flashed a smile, hoping that it didn’t look too fake. “I’ve heard of similar cases, and they are relatively easy to deal with.”
“Really?” Henry’s face brightened for the first time all day, and his tone was one of a child in the presence of a shyster birthday-party magician.
“Yeah,” I said, “no problem. Tomorrow I’ll call some people and they’ll conduct…sort of an exorcism. It’ll be a breeze.”
Henry sighed, relieved. “Okay.”
I looked again from corner to corner. “Hey, you want to go and get some dinner, my treat?”
Henry smiled again, his dark eyes alight. “Sure.”
We took my car, and drove off into the thickening gloom. Main Street was busier than it had been when I entered town; it was past six, and people were returning home from work in droves.
“Take a left up here,” Henry said as we approached the four-way, “and go for about…five miles. Place called Ryan’s.”
I nodded, lost in thought. I would have to call Tom Youngblood, the only demonologist in the Richmond area, in the morning. And maybe I would have to call the Catholic Church in town, too. Then again, the church has tried in recent years to distance itself from the supernatural.
I took the left, and descended down into the heart of Fairfield. Queerly, about a mile of hillside between the upper and lower sections had been left undeveloped, and was currently a hopeless tangle of dead grass.
“Man, I feel like a weight’s been lifted,” Henry said as we passed the dark shops and rain sluiced sidewalks, empty save for the phantom trees along the edge. “You can really do all of this tomorrow?”
“Yeah,” I said confidently. I took a deep breath, and seemed to blow away all of the mounting worry crushing my chest. I only had to call Tom and a priest, and they would take it from there. They were experts. It might not be an easy break, but it would get done. Demons were actually weak in the presence of religious men; which is why I abandoned my former atheism.
“Good. I can’t wait to get this shit behind me. It’s been a living hell, you know?”
I nodded, and then realized that it was probably too dark for Henry to see. “Yeah, I bet it’ll feel really good.”
“Like a million bucks,” Henry said.
“And…get rid of the damn bed. I don’t think that what we’re dealing with is…what you thought, but just burn it. It’s possible that the ghost is attached to it for some reason.”
“Way ahead of you, man,” Henry said. “I’m gonna go down to Mattress Warehouse and get me a new one tomorrow.”
At the end of town, just before the beginning of the dark, wet woods, I slowed at the traffic light, pulling to a stop alongside a school bus; the small lights affixed to the ceiling within were on against the dark. I saw a few dark silhouettes through the rectangular windows, and ascertained from their distorted shapes that they belonged to the high school’s football team.
“And…don’t have all your fun in one place, okay?” I said as we got back underway, the bus falling behind in the darkness.
“I ain’t gonna have that kinda fun for a long time.”
“Yeah, bullshit,” I jested in hopes of further lightening the mood, “you can’t go a week without having sex with someone…or something.”
Henry chuckled. “Yeah? I once went a month without doin your mom.”
“She needed that long to stop laughing at your…handicap.”
Henry laughed. “Okay. Just wait till we get there; take you in the bathroom and show you what’s up.”
I snorted. “What’s limp.”
“It won’t be limp when I shove it down…”
The restaurant, a sparkling oasis cloaked in primal black, loomed so quickly from the darkness that I nearly missed the turn.
“Alright,” Henry said after I had slid us into a slanted parking spot facing the empty road, his penis forgotten, “let’s get some grub.”
“You look like a German Jew,” I said as we got out of the car, “you need a good meal.”
“Yeah, thanks, mom,” Henry said as we crossed the parking lot. Through the big front windows, we could see happy families sharing joyful meals in the warm brightness.
We came to the double doors, and both held them open for the shuffling passage of an elderly couple. “Thank you,” the old man rasped and nodded as he helped his wife past us and toward a silver Cadillac parked in one of the closest handicap spots. They were immediately followed by two teenage girls in gym shorts and pink tops.
“What is it with kids dressing like that when it’s cold?” I whispered as we entered the restaurant, assaulted at once by the good odors of many steaming, mingling foods.
“If you got it flaunt it,” Henry reckoned.
We walked up to the long lunch counter and took cups, silverware and plastic trays from a hotplate guarded from inconsiderate sneezers by smudged plastic. We waited behind a party of rowdy college students to pay the casher.
We paid the chipper blond behind the register and were shown by a young sleepy eyed man in a red t-shirt and black slacks to a booth along the far wall of the room, mercifully away from the main population. Henry was immediately off to fix himself a plate at the buffet.
I sat at the booth for a moment, looking around the brightly lit room. It was crowded with families, mostly, passing food and laughing over their tables.
After another moment of inventorying how many people I would have to pass to get to the drink machine, I got up and moved to the Coke island. Apart from the dispenser there sat a plain metal canister marked with the picture of a tall, frosty glass of chocolate milk looming forward like a favorite uncle. I considered for a moment, and finally decided to get the milk, the likes of which I haven’t tasted since I was a child.
As I drew the dark liquid into my clear cup, a beefy older man in a brown leather jacket walked unthinkingly up to the machine and filled his cup with Sprite, all the while gasping softly to himself about someone named Mony-Mony.
Sidestepping a yellow WET FLOOR sign at the head of a nasty spill, I went back to the booth where Henry sat, bent protectively over a plate of fried chicken and breaded shrimp. I took my plate and quickly filled it up with French fries, several times nearly colliding with a young boy in small glasses examining each bright pile of food as if he would die if he did not detect the poison on his choices. At the booth I splattered a liberal amount of Tabasco sauce on the golden potatoes and dug in, my chocolate milk standing dutifully by should I need its aid.
“Remember Donny West?” Henry asked around a mouthful of food. I nodded. Donny had been one of our friends as kids before his mother moved the family to West Virginia. A beefy kid with red hair and deep freckles.
“Yeah. How can I forget?”
“He died.”
“What?” I asked, a bit of fry falling from my mouth and landing on the plate.
Henry nodded and swallowed. “I talked to his sister on Facebook, and she said he was drinking and wrecked his car into a tree a couple years ago. Took two of his friends with him.”
“That’s horrible,” I said numbly. Though I had not seen Donny in years, to hear that a once close friend was dead broke my heart.
“You remember what he did on April Fool’s Day that one time?” I asked Henry after a long, respectful moment of silence.
Henry nodded. “He had balls to do that.”
Donny, much more a practical joker than even Henry, had run the Stars and Bars of the Confederacy up the flag pole before school started that day. What made it even funnier were the facts that no one even noticed until lunch, and that the school sat right on the main highway in Picketts Meade.
“Yeah,” I sighed, black, cancerous nostalgia flooding me. “The good old days.”
We then lapsed into a comfortable silence. After savagely stripping the meat from a chicken bone, Henry wandered off to treat himself to a cold dessert. I finished the last of my fries and polished off the chocolate milk, my burning mouth greedily absorbing the cool liquid.
After a return trip to the machine, meeting once again the boy who had been diligently studying for his buffet safety PhD (he wasn’t quiet as conscientious when it came to Coca-Cola), I placed myself in my seat and awaited Henry. He soon returned empty-handed.
“They all sucked,” he declared.
I did not reply, but suddenly realized that the ice cream machine was next to the soda and chocolate milk fountains.
Suddenly, from across the room, there came a loud racket, drawling the puzzled stares of patrons in the gulf between walls. From a door came a line of people dressed in red shirts and black pants. The person at the head of the rank, a rather fetching teen goth with long midnight hair and a generous bosom, held something in her hands, something aflame, for her strong angler face was awash in orange. The Ryan’s troops behind her were clapping.
With mortification I saw them making a B-line toward our table like a personified children’s show choo-choo. Now all of the bemused eaters were looking toward me and Henry.
“You bastard,” I said, turning to Henry. He was smiling and clapping flourishingly. I broke out in my own grin, my cheeks afire. “Oh you son of a bitch; real funny.”
The Ryan’s Birthday Army now surrounded my half of the booth, leering over me like grinning psychos and clapping madly. I hung my head in embarrassment as they sat a flaming birthday cake on the table before me. “Bastard,” I muttered, lowering my head, realizing that now all of the other patrons too were looking at me and clapping.
Then the singing started.
I could just imagine Henry going up to our hostess and stage whispering across the counter, his hand shielding his mouth from prying lip readers, Pissst; it’s his birthday, pointing in my direction.
Bastard.
***
Coming out of the Ryan’s parking lot nearly half an hour later, I took a right on the rain swept street and followed it back to town past several large comfortable southern homes boasting screened in front porches and spotlighted flags. Most of these were protected from the street by rusted chin link fences.
We were silent and content, our stomachs full.
Finally desirous of breaking the silence, but too stuffed with food and lazy to speak, I switched on the radio, picking up a station from southern Maryland. After a “local” newscast about a New York mobster choking to death in a King George pizza joint and the discovery of a well-known radical poet shot dead in a D.C. parking garage, Cyndi Lauper came on with Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.
“Your song,” Henry croaked from the passenger seat.
I changed the station. The Culture Club was singing about a Church of the Poisoned Mind.
“Damn, must be your night,” Henry snickered from the darkness.
“Shut up,” I replied, hitting the scan button; the radio settled for a station playing a Seether song.
Henry laughed. “I meant you like eighties music. I wasn’t trying to say you’re gay…not that there’s anything wrong with that.”
Pulling to the end of Henry’s street, I noticed that we had left none of the lights on when we departed; the thought of waltzing through the door into the pitch black slightly uneased me.
I thought of asking Henry to stay with me at the Marriot in Richmond rather than me staying with him, but quickly decided against it; we’d be safe in the parlor.
Putting down my own childish reluctance, I parked the car at the curb and killed the engine, shutting Kanye West off in mid-rant.
We entered the house and immediately repaired to the parlor, where Henry took care of stoking a warm fire into existence.
That done, he came back to his chair and sank with a pleasured sigh. “So, you gonna write about this?”
To be honest, the thought hadn’t crossed my mind. “Maybe,” I said. Of course I would. Would it make it into my next book? It had a better chance than some of the other cases I had. People love their supernatural when it’s really weird.
“Well…” Henry said, but was interrupted by a terrible crash from overhead, which shook the house and caused us to jerk in surprised fear.
“There it is,” he shivered.
Another long bang sounded upstairs, as if something had thumped to the floor.
I swallowed around a lump in my throat, and opened my mouth, but was forestalled by another loud crash, this one followed by a stomach-piercing moan.
“Maybe we should go,” I stammered, a sudden bubble of stark fear overwhelming my cool rationality.
Henry licked his lips and swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing.
I looked appraisingly up at the smooth ceiling above my head, partly hidden by the gloom. There was another thump that stopped my heart and froze my blood. A shower of fine plaster rained down upon me like hard snow, and I quickly averted my eyes to avoid it.
“Henry?” I panted breathlessly, wrestling with my own galloping fear.
“Fuck this,” Henry affirmed and moved to stand, “let’s…”
Henry had been whispering, as if worried about disturbing his inconsiderate guest, so I was able to hear the soft, terrible footfall. It was as if an electric shock ran through me, reducing my bones to jelly.
I heard it again, louder this time.
Henry’s eyes were wide. “Was that…?” he whispered superstitiously.
I gulped and nodded. “It sounded like it…
From the dark upstairs hall there came a soft, fugitive creak. Henry was now fully standing, his wiry body tense and rigid.
“Hennnryyyyyy!” drifted a thin and ghostly greeting.
“Jesus Christ!” I exclaimed, and bolted to my feet. I turned to the dark threshold into the rest of the hostile house, and saw nothing but playing shadows.
“Hennnryyyy, baaaabyyyyyyy!”
I spun on my heels. “We have to get the hell out of here!” I whispered incoherently, my mind reeling. There was no hope of using the front door. We would have to pass the stairs…
Henry stood slack in place, his eyes wide and seeming to vibrate with terror.
There was a more confident footfall from halfway down the staircase, and a definite swish like that of a passing priest’s cassock.
“Come on!” I screamed, my fear boiling over. I desperately regarded the window beyond Henry’s chair. It appeared wide enough for both of us to escape side-by-side.
I grabbed Henry’s wrist, but pulling him was like trying to move a wooden post set deeply in the ground.
“Come on, we gotta go, NOW!!” I screamed franticly, hearing the loud moan of the last step. Henry shook his head as if shaking away a dream and looked at me with frightened, pleading eyes. But before a word could pass between us he turned back to the threshold.
And screamed.
Hearing the horrible, damned-soul quality of his voice broke my resolve and nearly my mind. It was the high-pitched shriek of a child on finally seeing the thing under its bed and finding it far worse than imagined; it was the scream of a sinner being shown into his new abode in hell; it was the pitiful cry of a madman.
Fueled by mindless animal terror, I sprang for the window.
Forearms thrown protectively over my face, I crashed through with a cry, and sailed into the damp night in a shower of broken glass, my stomach throbbing in my throat. I hit the grassy ground with an umph and staggered to my feet, my knees watery and quivering.
Behind me, the laughter of madness turned into the orgasm of agony.

Bleach is the debut album from obscure Seattle quartet, Nirvana. The rusty jams and popcorn melodies found on this album prove only that Kurt Cobain, Christ Noveselic, David Grohl, and Matt Cameron were ready for punk decades before the Clash hit the scene in 2016.
The album opens with "Blew", a pop orchestral piece that combines the knowing drum work of Cameron juxtaposed against Grohl's bass tuba. The song careens from haphazard to tiddly wink in the first nine bars as Cobain shouts "Smells like teen spirit!" over Christ's deep barber shop alto of "I pay my taxes" over and over. With samples of Pulp Fiction blended in with distorted Hostess commercial jingles, this song gives you all you need to know about the rest of the album: it's going to rock your body.
The next song is "Floyd the Barber". Cobain tells the tale of a gentle hair crafter who manages to shave his unwanted beard in defiance to current social norms. Cameron plays this one well with his doo wop beat playing a long game of hail mary football with Christ's distorted Moog. This sets a tone for the coming of age song as Cobain laments "Don't wanna be a lumberjack no more." The song ends with the Coda "The Dow is down but I'm upbeat, quit buying wine with welfare if you can't afford heat." Never before has such a conservative message of conforming so infused a punk song.
"About a Girl" starts off with a detuned violin accompanying what sounds like a dolphin trying to trade afterbirth for a pork sirloin. As the song meanders through Cobain's stock portfolio, Grohl twists the volume up to 11 on his tuba and SNAKES ALIVE! plays a solo that would make Meatloaf weep. Of all the Seattle bands, the signature Grohl tuba helps Nirvana stand out as a rock band that was gonna take no prisoners and follow no rules.
"School" is a fuzzy instrumental cascading between arena rock guitar and roller skate rink with a drug dealer in back tuba that is not only infectious, but also is illegal in nine states due to the criminal amounts of Nyquil involved. I put this on the turntable and nearly shook my glass of milk of oatmeal cookies off the counter! I phoned a friend and said "Listen to this" and put the phone up to the record player and then hung up on him. The song was that good.
"Love Buzz" is another in a long list of Public Image Limited covers that I think everyone was tired of by 1989. But it does have its splashes of charm, including Cameron's symbol work and Grohl's avant garde use of nine track cassette looping. Give a man an ear and he will fish for days, but give a man some raw guitar distorted with the use of a model airplane as a pic and you will feed a man chowder for life. Although, the cover is a bit cliche, it still sets a tone that makes way for the second half of this wall to wall noise explosion of salad dressing.
"Paper Cuts" is about filing taxes before computers. The narrator (Cobain) drills off reasons why EZ forms are not so easy. He brings us closer to his reality of a struggling musician trying to deal with the wall of society and his penchant for buying junk bonds. The listener soon realizes that there's no way the narrator could possibly use an EZ form given his alimony payments, joint stock adventures, and special dividends. Cobain shrieks "If I can't be EZ I can't be me!" to a vacant room as the song ends and one can almost hear papers rustling in the background before giving way to Cameron's famous steak sauce for ketchup double shotgun two tap drum beat.
"Negative Creep" is Christ's turn to shine. With what can only be called forgettable guitar playing he laps up the volume box as he delves into the suicide bomber riffs that bring plenty of laughs to coeds in a balls to the wall circus of the stars steel wheeling lullaby two story beat of concrete Pat Buchanan beat boxing on a silver table atopped with gold house party adventure-con.
"Scoff" begins with a short poem about Grohl's need to leave Seattle and start his own band that will make one good record and then a bunch of theme music for Transformers films. Cobain then chimes in with an eerie preternatural image of Lake Washington overrun by a giant retailer and slaver. Once again, Christ's jaw dropping, vomit inducing, chili fries in a dryer turned to max guitar work ladles on the funk over Cobain's jaded lyrics.
"Swap Meet" is about young love at a swap meet. Plus Grohl's bending tuba performance that makes that show Manimal look like a documentary about cat videos.
"Mr. Mustache" is a debonair nuance into the casualness of sex in the 80s. Cobain claims that "Love can't be found in an empty condom wrapper in the back of a 711 with two fifty" (in his pocket). The song explodes with more capable tuba work and drum slams cut off at the chase by Cobain on a detuned fiddle in a casino in Fife. The song ends with the sound of one of the Buffalo slot machines paying off.
The album ends with "Sifting" which is a slow Bell Biv Devoe-esque number that will have your family rump shaking in no time. The song was later appropriated to the theme music of "Family Matters" and is in everyone's hearts still today. I can't tell you how many times I've listened to this song while spooning a pillow case full of sauerkraut.
I give this album a B+.

Contributors: u/WhymEYEhere u/gadzooooooks u/knucklefang u/sicuho u/pidgewiffler u/Whiskeypixie24 u/inkwell13 u/theintervet u/acemccrank u/mark_das_stoner u/emmittthenervend u/im_back u/craterfist u/Quibblicous u/pandabear905 u/FatherAzerun u/purplekiwi u/raykendo u/evankh u/myeviltwin47 u/thegreeklettertau u/snarkywombat u/dmcdoogs u/makoto20 u/thedrunkenmagi u/anselhelm u/bbbebbb

1. Violin of Silence: This violin is made of a very expensive wood and has a horse hair bow string. The violin makes no sound, not even when dropped or smashed.
   
2. Blindfold of Sight: A black cloth blindfold that when attuned to allows the wearer to have an extra 30 feet of darkvision while their eyes are covered by it.
   
3. Necklace of Repulsion: An ornate silver necklace that once attuned to forces the creature to make an intelligence saving throw of 19. On a failed save they feel an intense urge to unattune to the necklace.
   
   1. Ghostly Dice: A pair of red six sided die that once rolled continue to roll until something stops them.
4. Torriens Ring: A blue ring that once attuned to changes color to be either red or green.
   
5. Mirror of The Ghast: A large mirror that does not show the reflection of living creatures. The effects of this mirror do not work on creatures who are immune to poison or are elven.
   
6. Prototype Swords of Vision: A collection of swords ranging from greatswords to rapiers that once attuned to allows the creature to be colorblind for an hour. This ability can be used once per long rest.
   
7. Zeki’s Box of Water: A rusty copper box with small dents scattered around it. The box is always full of illusionary water. When the water hits an object other than the box it disappears.
   
8. Book of Reading: A large tome with a velvet cover. If a creature can read the book fully then they gain the ability to read.
   
9. Philosophers Stone: A jade stone the size of a halflings palm with a number carved into it. Each dawn the number changes between one to one hundred.
   
10. Shoes of Planned Obsolescence: Leather shoes that look very plain. The shoes take twice the amount of wear and tear as regular shoes.
    
11. Ring of Detect Magic: This unassuming metal band glows blue when there is magic nearby. However, since it itself is a magic item, it is always glowing blue.
    
12. Wand of Smelling: Touch any moveable object with this wand. If the wand likes the smell, it will glow green...if it does not like the smell it glows red...if it can't decide, it glows blue. The glow fades after 6 seconds.
    
13. Jumpsuit of Teleportation: This stylish, full-body jumpsuit can only be activated when worn by itself due to weight limitations. When activated, the suit will be teleported to the desired location, but not the character wearing it.
    
14. Journal of Stubbornness: A small empty journal that looks completely normal to everyday people except the pages cannot be written in.
    
15. Crown of Arcane Harmony: A golden crown with many colorful and expensive jewels on it. once attuned to the crown, a creature has learned to master the process of attunement. The maximum ammount of magic item it can attune to is increased by one.
    
16. Bagpipes of Invisibility: For as long as you play these bagpipes, you are invisible. You are, however, incredibly audible even when in magical silence.
    
17. Weather Detecting Stone: A small flat stone perfect for skipping across a pond. If this stone is wet, it is raining. If it is warm, it is sunny. If it is white, it's snowing. Requires access to the open sky to function.
    
18. Wand of Lightening Bolts: Bane of tailors everywhere, you may target a fabric object within 60 feet with this wand, causing its color to fade by several degrees.
    
19. Ring of Invisibleness: A platinum band ring. The ring is invisible when worn.
    
20. The Compass of The North: This copper compass points towards whatever you tell it to find, as long as it is north of you. When it is not in use or cannot find an object due to it not being north of the compass, the compass defaults to pointing north.
    
21. Oversized Cloak: A black cloak with giant runes transcribed inside of it. When attuned, the cloak resizes to your form, though slightly too large.
    
22. Skeleton Repellent: A clear perfume bottle with cleanish yellow liquid that contains 1d4 uses. This spray on works on the creature that uses it. A spray from this can forces the user's skeleton to escape into the ethereal plane for 1d6 hours. During this time, the creature can still breath, speak, and drink as normal. However, the creature's movement is reduced to 0 and cannot make a melee attack or cast a spell that requires movement. If this spray is used on a creature other than the one spraying it, it has no effect.
    
23. Toering of Lockpicking: This must be worn around the toe, and gives advantage when using Thieves Tools with your feet.
    
24. Ring of Undoing: This ring undoes the last action taken by the wearer, which is to put on the Ring of Undoing.
    
25. Bag of Dropping: This bag functions as a small portal to an extradimensional space. Any number of items may be placed in the bag up to a storage capacity of 64 cubic feet. All items placed in the bag are lost in the Astral Sea and replace with an equivalent amount of manure, buffalo chips, or guano.
    
26. Prototype Cloak of Hugs: This furry cloak should sense when you need a hug, and gives you the right squeeze at the right time. Unfortunately it always squeezes too tight.
    
27. Wand of Witch Slaying: A black oak wand that can cast power word kill as a cantrip. The wand does not work if there isn’t a full moon, if the target isn’t a witch, if the user is an elf, goliath, or orc, if the user is taller than 6’1 or smaller than 5’11, if the user didn’t eat a breakfast worth 7 silver pieces that morning, if the user or target was born in cold weather, if it’s summer, if the user ate corn that week, if the user doesn’t have a pet rat, and if the user is older than 21. The DC for the spell is a constitution save of 3.
    
28. Amulet of Immortality: A silver amulet with a small diamond. While a creature is wearing the amulet they can use an action to cast revivify on themselves as an action. The creature must have at least five hit points to use the Amulet of Immortality
    
29. Ring of Fire Detection: A red band ring with a ruby. The ring glows upon touch with fire.
    
30. Cloak of Cold Detection: A blue and gold cloak that shivers when it gets cold.
    
31. Shirt of Abjuration: This white common cloth shirt cannot be affected by cantrips. While the wearer is still hurt by damage caused by cantrips the shirt does not. This includes cantrips like prestidigitation or mending.
    
32. Pants of Abjuration: This pair of jeans cannot be affected by cantrips. While the wearer is still hurt by damage caused by cantrips the shirt does not. This includes cantrips like prestidigitation or mending.
    
33. Pocket Watch of The Far Realm: This blue pocket Watch with a silver chain always tells the accurate time of the entire plane of the far realm. The far realm is a place beyond space and time. The pocket watches hands move fast and sporadically, sometimes even gaining a third and fourth hand.
    
34. The Flip Coin: A gold coin magically imbued with graviturgy that, when flipped to make a decision, always lands on its edge.
    
35. Cursed Amulet: When worn it sings the most annoying theme song it came up with for the party. Taking it off does not stop the song.
    
36. Wand of Antimagic: A wand with burn marks at the tip from when it was struck by lightning. The wand allows the spellcaster to use their bonus action to counterspell their own spell.
    
37. Wings of Flight: A cloak that is either black or white. When activated, the black cloak turns into a pair of giant bat wings; the white turns into a pair of angel wings. They then immediately detach from the wearer’s back and fly away.
    
38. Hammer of Efficient Lock Picking: When struck forcefully against a simple lock of standard materials for an hour, the lock will magically break apart. Generally, the lock is broken long before the function triggers.
    
39. Crystal Wine Glass of Returning: When thrown, this delicate and intricate wineglass will return to the holders hand by the end of the round after being thrown. Sadly, the glass is extraordinarily fragile and even a strike against the lightest surface could shatter it, with unfortunate consequences upon returning if the thrower is not wearing gauntlets.
    
40. Hammer of Singing: When this xylophone hammer strikes any key on a xylophone, the sound emanates from the hammer and not the xylophone.
    
41. Comb of The Frostmaiden: Despite it’s name, any gender may wear this ornate almost tiara-like comb in their hair. When donned, the comb grants the character the ability to shed dandruff once per round.
    
42. Sky Stone: A smooth pebble that weighs negative five pounds. If not held down, it will fall upward and disappear into the sky.
    
43. Dimension Window: A framed "painting" that displays an alien landscape, complete with motion and sound. There is no way to enter the painting and no way to scry what region it is displaying, if it is even a real place.
    
44. Glove of Offense: A single leather glove. When the hand wearing this glove is used to make an attack, a voice coming from the glove yells an offensive joke or insult directed at the target.
    
45. Joke Deck: On casual observation, it appears to be an ordinary complete deck. If the deck is drawn from, the card will always be a card normally not found in the deck. (an 11 of Spades, a Purple Joker, etc.)
    
46. Dandruff of Vecna: A bag of skin flakes that magically replenishes at 1d4 cubic inches per day. The flakes have an odd mildewey flavor.
    
47. Dracomyres Squid: A miniature stone squid statue with sapphires for eyes. The squid does not descend from gravity. If one tries to drop the statue it will stay in the air until another creature takes it. When thrown the statue has a constant height but slows down faster than most objects its size until it stops in midair.
    
48. Mask of Fame: A completely white mask that when worn displays the wearer’s name in gold letters on the masks forehead.
    
49. Shoes of Comedy: A pair of jester shoes with bells attached to the top of each toe. The bells sound like laughter when they jingle. When the person wearing the shoes makes a joke the shoes become quiet for 1d4 turns.
    
50. Carpet of Filth: A beige carpet that is very hard to clean. The Carpet of Filth takes twice as long to clean and when a stain is added there’s a 10% chance it cannot be removed without magical means.
    
51. Bracelet of The Occult: A black metal bracelet with etchings of demons and devils on it. When a creatures blood goes through the bracelet it becomes black for one hour. The bracelet is for evil rituals but even the cult that uses it knows it’s only for effects and their rituals don’t need the bracelet at all to work.
    
52. Cicero’s Stopwatch: A magical clock made of gold with a red button on its side. When the button is pressed all time is stopped for 1d100 turns for everything including the creature using the stopwatch. When time is stopped nothing can move and when time continues it continues as if nothing happened.
    
53. Monocle of Illusion: A golden monocle with a near indestructible lens that makes the wearer’s vision in both eyes blurry when worn.
    
54. Bottle of The Hunter: A green bottle that has a note inside with instructions on how to use it. When the bottle is spun it will always point to the nearest humanoid creature. The nearest humanoid creature is always going to be the one who spun the bottle. If the spinner moves from the bottle it will continue spinning until it’s stopped.
    
55. Ring of The Dark Curse: A silver band with a black diamond that once attuned to cursed the wearer. The attuned gets a -4 to all stats has disadvantage on all rolls. The curse can only be lifted by having the wearer no longer wish to be cursed.
    
56. Meltable Wood: Meltable Wood as the name suggests is wood that melts at high temperatures. Meltable Wood comes in oak, cyprus, redwood, and cedar.
    
57. Chessboard of Anger: A normal looking chessboard that when two people start playing a d10 is rolled. The number rolled on the d10 is how many turns each player gets before the board magically flips over causing the pieces to go flying.
    
58. Chair of Torment: A wooden rocking chair that magically feels uncomfortable. The chair was made by an angry carpenter as revenge to a farmer that gave him overpriced cabbage.
    
59. Water Powered Piano: A grand piano with no strings. The piano can play magically without them. The piano can only be played when a gallon of water is poured into the piano. For every gallon put in the piano is one hour that the piano can be played.
    
60. Psychic Vase: An orange vase that can telepathically speak to creatures within 30 feet of it. The vase only tells creatures “I can speak by thinking to you. Good morning”.
    
61. Tyresian’s Contraption: A strange looking machine that has the shape of a typewriter with a small indent and a small thin slot. The machine is supposed to have a creature out their thumb in the small indent and a paper would come out of the thin slot accurately predicting their full name. The machine actually has a blank paper come out of the thin slot.
    
62. Tough Butter: A stick of butter that when put in water becomes tougher than steel. The butter returns to normal when it is dried.
    
63. Scroll of Page Armor: When this scroll is activated, the caster becomes entirely immune to papercuts, dry rot, and having to carry documents for legislators.
    
64. Ring of Warning: The ring sometimes glows bright blue, at intervals with no discernible pattern or cause. When it is glowing, it has the effect of the light cantrip.
    
65. Bag of Golding: Any item placed inside the bag is instantly turned into solid gold. It reverts to its original form immediately when it is removed.
    
66. Bowl of Drinking: A small wooden bowl that is sentient and has 1 intelligence, 1 wisdom, and 1 charisma. When water is put into the bowl it will mysteriously begin to disappear over the course of 1 minute if the bowl is full. This is because the bowl will drink any water that’s put inside of it. If the bowl drinks too much water it will die and become a mundane wooden bowl.
    
67. Ring of Dreaming Telepathy: The wearer can read other people’s thoughts, only the thoughts come to the wearer as dreams, when they’re asleep and they can’t recall the dreams when they wake up.
    
68. Calendar note: A yellow square note that tells you what day it is, every day, with the message "It is today" written upon it. If something is written on this note, it will be replaced by "It is today".
    
69. Wand of Create Wand of Create Wand: A simple looking wand with a single charge. When used, the wand disintegrates but an identical wand appears at the users feet.
    
70. Poison of Health: This yellow poison is made from repurposed health potions. A creature subjected to this poison regains any hit points lost from the inflicting attack.
    
71. Mages Wagon Wheel: A tiny lightweight wheel that can be controlled with a mini wand that comes in many colors. The wand has a ten foot range. the wheel is easily breakable. A great gift for the kids on the holidays.
    
72. Forever Cleaning Broom: This broom detects dirt on the floor and sweeps it up into a pile. It the detects dirt in a pile and spreads it out across the floor. This repeats until someone cleans the dirt themself.
    
73. Attunement Statue: This small handheld statue depicts a person in meditation. Once attuned, the face of the statue animates and informs the user that they are attuned to it, then deanimates.
    
74. Monogamous Pillow: Only the person attuned to this pillow can fall asleep while resting on it. Anyone else attempting to rest on it will stay awake until they attune to it.
    
75. The Orb Of Perfect Hindsight: This magical orb watches each action taken by the individual who has it in their possession. When the individual does something stupid, especially something that hurts them, it proceeds to tell the individual at length why they shouldn't have done that. The orb speaks in the individual's native tongue and uses a parental, judging tone.
    
76. Artificers Hat: A stylish black top hat that when attuned to makes the wearer feel heavier. The wearer’s weight does not change. This hat was the first magical item made by a powerful artificer. While it isn’t worth much it’s held very dear to its creator.
    
77. Jar of Red Dye: A mason jar that turns liquids red when put in and shaken for a minute.
    
78. Jar of Blue Dye: A mason jar that turns liquids blue when put in and shaken for a minute.
    
79. Jar of Green Dye: A mason jar that turns liquids green when put in and shaken for a minute.
    
80. Cloak of Skin: A cloak that looks like it’s made of human skin. When worn by a creature the cloak transmutates itself into being made out of the wearer’s skin.
    
81. Prototype Socks of Pleasant Smells: A pair of white socks with a thin red line going horizontally around the ankle. The socks always smell like burnt French fries.
    
82. Tome of Minor Teleportation: A large book with a black cover that once attuned to allows the owner to teleport at will. The teleportation has a range of 3 inches and requires the the owner not to be restrained or grappled. The Tome does not work while wearing metal.
    
83. Ring of Surging Action: A golden ring with a ruby that has the soul of a brave warrior inside of it. While wearing the ring the wearer can use an action to use action surge once on every turn.
    
84. Wallet of Teeth: A black leather wallet that has 2d6 teeth inside of it. The teeth reappear at dawn if removed. The teeth are not sharp and are loose in the wallet.
    
85. Wig of Movement: An unkempt grey wig made of rat fur that will at random moments fly off of the wearer’s head and land anywhere from 5 to 40 feet away from them.
    
86. Prototype Crystal Ball: A crystal ball that when looked into by a creature that has a 3rd level spell slot can show the immediate future of a random creature. The creature can be from any plane and it only shows up to a half a minute into their future.
    
87. Orb of Hurt: This purple magic orb causes pain when dropped on ones foot. However it causes no pain when being used intentionally to cause pain.
    
88. Magic Cat Statue: A small marble statue of a cat that has a large gold coin it’s holding. When placing the cat on a desk, bed, counter, etc, all objects that weigh less than 10 pounds are flung onto the floor when nobody is looking.
    
89. Wizards Pinecone: A seemingly normal pinecone that when held shrinks to half its original size, then grows twice its original size, and continues to do so until put down.
    
90. Staff of Ducks: A thick staff with vines wrapped around it. When a caster expends a spell slot to cast any spell 1d4 illusionary ducks will be summoned and waddle away. The ducks disappear after a minute.
    
91. Ball of Sadness: A small yellow rubber ball with a red circle on it that cannot bounce. It was made by an angry old witch to trick kids with. She would tell the kids the ball only bounces for people who have parents that love them. It was a very effective way for her to get the tears of children needed for her youth cream.
    
92. Crown of The Underdark Mage: A purple crown with amethysts that once attuned to causes the wearer’s skin to turn purple. The effects last as long as the crown is worn.
    
93. Jewel of Vision: A diamond that when looked into slows the user to see through glass.
    
94. Mattress of Earthquakes: A beige queen sized mattress that, at random points of the night, shakes violently.
    
95. Potion of Dry Skin: A thin white liquid that sucks the moisture out of a creatures skin when drinking it. The potions effects are removed when the creature soaks in warm or cold water for 15 minutes.
    
96. Oven Mitts of Heat Conduction: A pair of black oven mitts that magically transfer heat that it touches through the glove. The creator of these oven mitts has burn scars still on his hands to this day that he refuses to talk about.
    
97. Mutators Door: A door that changes the type of wood it’s made out of when something knocks on it.
    
98. Water of The Drunkard: A bottle of wine that tastes like water. This wine was a failed attempt at making the first magically infused wine.
    
99. Wallace’s and Loki’s Weapons of Ash: Weapons that we’re made by Loki, a notoriously powerful cleric of trickery and Wallace, an artificer and good friend of Loki. The weapons of ash range from long swords, greatswords, maces, whips, arrows, longbows, warhammers, etc. The weapons are made to look like masterfully crafted weapons. Each weapon has a +3 to hit but once a weapon hits a target it immediately turns to ash.