|1-Our ghost struck again



Our  house  isn't very special.  It is quite big, seven floors high.  We
had  an  intergalactic zoo in it.  One day we were just about to receive
an animal shipment...

The  shipment  arrived  at the 27th of October.  It was brought from the
planet  Junglion,  where  we had been visiting a year ago to get to know
the  local  animals.   When  the  shipment  package was opened, we found
inside  a couple of gorzans, a Gigantosaurus child fed with buzzers, and
a  school  of  opera  fish in a soundproof aquarium.  We got the animals
quite  easily  to the zoo.  Only the Gigantosaurus child caused trouble.
It  had  eaten all the buzzers and was making noise, until we noticed to
feed it with dingoes, which taste just about the same.

After  getting  the animals to their cages we wrote in our diary "Animal
shipment  from Junglion received 27th October 1991", and wondered why we
had  circled the 11th of November.  But far away from here was somebody,
who  knew  it  all too well.  He was a ghost, though at that moment on a
vacation.

We  lived  happily  for  some  time and paid for the shipment the 8th of
November  to  the planet Zomem, whose colony planet Junglion is.  On the
9th  day  the  night beetles stopped buzzing.  On the 10th day the opera
fish  also  looked afraid.  At 19:45 o'clock our technic, Jehm Merkpork,
got  two  scared  dogs  in  his  lap.   At  20:07 I, animal expert Jeemi
Bilisdo,  got  a  swarm  of  iron beetles in my lap.  At 20:20 o'clock a
crying  tiger  crashed into the lap of our janitor Jyssa Nirdam.  I gave
the  iron  beetles  some  papapalm  to eat and Jyssa cleaned the tiger's
cage.  Then we went to sleep.

In  the  morning  our ichtyologist Jirme Ihegis was thoroughly wet.  The
opera  fish  had  screamed  so high, that the aquarium class had broken.
Jehm  went to fix it and went pale with fear.  In front of him floated a
ghost  just  as pale.  It had come to celebrate the 880th anniversary of
his forefather at 11:11 o'clock.

His  forefather had been the old ghost of the house in the 12th century.
He  had  come here 11.11.1111 at 11:11 o'clock and scared the staff that
lived  in  the brewery that had been here in that time.  The brewery was
demolished on the 3th of December after being empty for 20 days.

Our  ghost  had  decided  to  do  the same now, 880 years later.  But it
wouldn't do, for on the 7th of December the baronling Jera Typrewam with
his  nephew  Jyhi  Rijimöga  was  coming  to visit us.  We couldn't just
disappoint  them  with  a  demolished zoo.  So we had to chase the ghost
away.

We went straight to work.  Jyssa armed himself with a silver broom, Jehm
installed   ghost-locks   on   the  doors  and  I  prepared  myself  for
negotiations.   The  ghost  was coming.  I sat at the table and welcomed
him.   He  said  in  a  scary  voice:   "What is the meaning of this?" I
replied in a voice just as scary:  "We have negotiations to make."

I  invited the ghost to sit down, but he just slid through the chair, so
he  had  to float in front of me.  I asked him:  "Didn't your forefather
haunt  this  place enough?", and he replied:  "No.  We have to celebrate
his  anniversary  every now and then.  And now is his 880th birthday." I
insisted:   "But  it won't do!  We have guests." The ghost asked:  "When
can  I  come,  then?"  so  I  replied:  "Come on the 888th birthday 11th
November 1999." The ghost agreed to hat.  He left saying:  "See you in 8
years!"

That  was  that.  We cleaned the place up quickly and prepared the state
visit  for  three  weeks.  When Jera and Jyhi came at last, Jyhi sighed:
"These  animals  are  so  boring!   I  wish  you  had  ghosts!" We heard
ourselves  sigh:  "Oh no!" and Jirme suggested:  "Couldn't you come back
here in the year 1999?"

End