Engineers Meet Ghosts

People have very varied reactions to encounters with the paranormal, ranging from denial to completely freaking out. Engineers, being of scientific mind, usually do not immediately jump to conclusions when they experience weird goings-on. Here are two stories told by engineers about strange, uncanny encounters with the unexplained:

The first storyteller, Paul, was an electrical engineering student at the University of Minnesota. One Thanksgiving break he decided to go to the rustic family cabin in northern Wisconsin so he could read and study, rather than stay in the city for Turkey Day. Loading his car with books and provisions for the weekend, he drove to the muddy access lane to the cabin and packed in his supplies. At the cabin, he lit a fire and settled in.

 Later that evening as he was reading on the sofa, Paul heard a noise on the front porch that sounded like muffled footsteps. Opening the front door, he walked onto the porch and looked around. He called out. but there was no response; he shone a flashlight into the trees surrounding the cabin, but could see nothing moving. The woods were still and dark. He walked around the cabin, but could see no evidence of a trespasser. The cabin was about mile from the paved road, and he knew that a visitor to the cabin in late November would be very unlikely.

Once again, Paul settled down reading by the fire. About a half hour later, he distinctly heard heavy footsteps coming up the steps to the porch.  The sound of boots hitting the porch deck came from the steps to the door. Before he could to get up and go to the door, it suddenly violently burst open, hitting the wall as it swung. To his astonishment, no one stood there in the doorway. Paul jumped up and ran out on the porch. As before, all was dark and quiet. He could hear no sound of anyone or anything moving in the pitch black woods.

 Unsettled, Paul went back inside. What to do? It was a mile hike back to the car through the woods, and after that, he'd have a five-hour drive back to the Twin Cities. Paul turned to the open door and declared, "I didn't see anything or hear anything, and I'm going back to my reading." He closed the door and returned to his place by the fire.

For the rest of the weekend, he heard nothing untoward and there were no more disturbances. On Sunday, he drove back to the Cities rested and ready to resume his engineering studies.

The second story came from an engineering professor who related his experience while housesitting over the weekend for a friend when he lived in San Francisco. On the first day he was there, he had left a couple of dirty breakfast dishes in different places in the house. Later that afternoon, he noticed these dishes in the kitchen sink, even though he could not recall putting them there.

 When this same thing occurred the next morning, he was puzzled. Being of scientific bent, he decided to experiment by deliberately placing several soiled dishes throughout the house and noting where he put them. Later that day, he found all of the dishes sitting in the kitchen sink.

That was enough to satisfy his curiosity. Yes, a tidy unseen person was apparently moving dirty dishes into the sink. Since he was there only two days, he did not experiment further. He washed the dishes and put them away, and that was that.