218 – Ghosts of the Shooting Star – Stories from Minnesota ParaCon 2018
So, we hopped in the Sunspot van and Wendy, Scott from WhatsYourGhostStory.com , and I drove a thousand miles this weekend to the Shooting Star Casino in Mahnomen, Minnesota for their 2018 Paracon. It was a fun-filled three days where we made dozens of new friends, talked about hundreds of paranormal experiences, and even got to play some Blackjack (Wendy has a system, in case you were wondering!)
Now, we’ve had vendor tables at several different paranormal conventions before and it is hard to stand out. You’re competing with celebrities (we had two lovely actresses right next to us and Chip frickin’ Coffey right across the way), paranormal presentations, a bar open all day, and gambling. How are we going to get people’s attention with our little podcast? Well, we decided to create a paranormal quest where people could enter to win a sweet prize package of ghost tour tickets, Sunspot CDs, books on Chicago ghost stories, and a haunted Gingerbread house.
So, how were we going to get everyone to come on by and get weird with us? Well, we tried to do a little “paranormal quest” game where we had three sections:
- A area about my haunted history tour company, American Ghost Walks where I asked them a question about Minneapolis because we have a tour there
- A See You On The Other Side -centered section where we polled them on their favorite paranormal topic
- A WhatsYourGhostStory.com ghost confessional where we asked them if they’ve ever seen a ghost
Once people answered our questions, then we entered them into the drawing! So, what did we discover about the Paracon attendees?
- “Purple Rain” is their favorite Prince song by a huge margin
- There’s not as many Vikings fans as you’d think, most of them couldn’t even name a player
- Ghosts are the most popular topic, followed by demons, then UFOs (I know, right? Unexpected.). Cryptids came in last, which broke Bigfoot’s heart.
- More than three-quarters of the people we met had a personal ghostly encounter and a majority of them were about their family and loved ones. That was really nice. They were mainly positive and comforting experiences.
So, since ghosts were the topic that most people were interested in, we decided to interview a few of the presenters about some of their most memorable ghostly encounters. In this episode, we have personal ghost stories from:
- Erin Ryder from Destination Truth and Chasing UFOs
- Jael De Pardo from Destination Truth and The Unexplained
- Author on everything from The Slenderman to Nessie, Nick Redfern
- Actress and scream queen, Erin Marie Hogan
For the song this week, we used the name of the place, the Shooting Star Casino, as the initial inspiration. Time flies like a shooting star and as John Lennon said on Double Fantasy :
Before you cross the street take my hand.
John Lennon, “Beautiful Boy”
Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.
When we’re young and we think about the future, there’s a sense of wonder. I saw a lot of that this weekend. There were psychics making predictions and mediums who say they can talk to the dead. We dream about what might happen and wish for something better. Some nights seem like they’ll last forever, but they don’t, before we know it the future is here, whether we’re ready or not and the important part is to try and not lose that sense of wonder that makes the whole thing worthwhile. That’s the idea behind this quick rock track, “Best-Laid Plans”.
Staring at the sky til dawn
laid out in front of your piece of crap car
this getaway could not go wrong
so we made a wish on every single star
And all those summer nights
that weren’t meant to last
like a shooting star
they just burn so fast
Yeah, we ran away
but the best-laid plans
are fantasies
So if you make that wish, I will believe.
And then we tried to tell the future
We looked at our palms and studied all the lines
When every kiss was an adventure
and we laughed at all the hearts we’d leave behind
And all those summer nights
that weren’t meant to last
like a shooting star
they just burn so fast
Yeah, we ran away
but the best-laid plans
are fantasies
So if you make that wish, I will believe.
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