Hehehe... This week's blog homework just thrills me. I adore superstitions. Most are silly, some are creepy, others are just confusing. The superstitions surrounding ghosts and the Fae are my favorite. I'm by no means an expert on them, but I have a feeling I'm going to be looking up some reading to brush up on the subject. (Thanks, @rambo, @charmaine and @lyxzen) I'll likely get nothing else done this weekend. Heh.
I like to think I'm pretty rational, but there are still some superstitions I go in for.
1. The not walking under a ladder thing? Duh. That's just safe, because guys who use ladders drop shit.
2. The black cat. Because they seem to try to cross my path. I'm not sure if bad luck follows them, or they follow it, but I've never met a black cat who was not personally unlucky. (Example: Friend's cat liked to drink out of the toilet. Fell in. And, in the process of freaking out about that, managed to close the lid on himself. Poor guy.)
3. I tend to not cross faerie rings. They say never to sleep in one, either. If you aren't familiar withe faerie rings, this is what one looks like...
Generally it's mushrooms, but it can be flowers, too. I've heard it said that if it's flowers, it's a sign of permanent fae residence, or that it's different court or type of faerie.
4: Looking behind: In both Fae and ghost lore, there are disparate superstitions about looking behind you. I do a great deal of my walking at night. They say that certain spirits and fae can't move/can't follow you if you look over your shoulder. I can't say I do it for precisely that reason; generally, it's just an awareness thing for me, but the superstition always comes to mind when I do it.
5: Sports superstition: These are hilarious, almost to a one. People do some insane fricking stuff to give their teams a boost toward posting a W. From wearing certain things (and sometimes not washing them all season-- by the playoffs, you do NOT want to sit next to these guys) all the way to zany rituals... you know what they say: "It's only weird... if it doesn't work."
The one I go in for is pregame dinner at Outback before going to see my Lincoln Stars play. It doesn't seem to make much of a difference in how they play, as far as I can tell, but it's part of the game for me. Because, hey, even if they skate like epileptic mule deer on acid, I still got cheese fries.
