Cheers, kittens! It's Moi, your Hannah Hart, ghostdame of the Hotel del Coronado! I imagine scads of you are reading on your devices whilst trapped amongst the winter remnants of Nor'easter Nemo. Ergo, I shall spare you the complaints of how chilly it is here in San Diego, in February: 56 with a low of 43! Of course, being a ghost, I'm always cold: sunny beach weather or no. (New to this ghostdame concept? My bio will get you up to speed.)

Well, if you're a geek in love and whether snowbound in Beantown or surfside in Solana Beach, chances are kippy you're focused on one of two things right now: Valentines Day and/or WonderCon. Should you be fortunate enough to live in Southern California, my Hotel Del, in this year of their 125th anniversary, is hosting the Sweetheart Ball for a mere $125.00/person for dance floor-flanked dining: $100.00/person for the rest of the Crown Room. Get out the red lipstick, your swishiest beaded skirt and those dancing heels, all you hot tomatoes! The Fox Trot is where it's at this year!

Ah, home for the holidays! It’s a dilly of a time to throw your hands up and be the kid again: no responsibilities, no worries, no tasks, no requirements. Just sit back on the old brocade divan and wait for Mom to bring you truffles and a cup of Privateer eggnog, your older brother to slip you a sawbuck or two (plus some extra whiskey in your nog) and for Dear Old Dad to question you about what you’re doing with your money. For my part, Dad’s been asking me the same question for decades and for decades, I’ve been giving him the same answer: “Why, it’s all in my closet, right where it belongs!”

 

Now, it’s supposed to be darn cold this Christmas in Boston. Seems like it’s always cold in Boston and that’s why I made like a baby and headed straight out of there, getting myself to sunny California. Plus, I wanted to get into moving pictures. Did some good stuff, too. Ever see Gold Diggers of 1933? Yep, that’s me in the back, the one high-kicking in the sequined bathing suit. Nice gig, but Joan Blondell stole my part. Heifer. That cement mixer couldn’t dance to save her life. I should have had the lead. That’s all right ‘cause she had to put up with that octopus director. All those hands! He had more moves than a Navy brat. I digress. Anyhoo, like a lot of you this holiday season, I’m homeward bound and it’s a big deal for me!

First, I'm leaving my haunt, which I don't do very often: The Hotel del Coronado in gorgeous, vibrant San Diego. Ever visited? Make a ressie! There's no place like The Holidays at The Del! From Thanksgiving dinner at the famous Crown Room, to Skating by the Sea and cozy fire-ring cocktails overlooking the Pacific, it's the bee's knees, kids! (Brief bio, in case you're curious: Just after I moved out here, wouldn't it figure, I died at The Del, in a dancing incident in 1934, and it was all Ida Lupino's fault. She has no natural rhythm, all flailing arms. We still don't talk. Oh, well. At least I died sporting sequins and rhinestones and some dynamite gams!)

Secondly, despite what you living folk might think, we ghosts only get a couple of times a year when we can leave our haunts. It takes bonkers amount of energy to travel; so, we save up our strength, pretty much like you save up your cabbage, and hit the astral planes. It’s exhausting and can take all day to get across this great big country. Sure, it’s easier than enduring one of your modern flights, but it’s still arduous. Mom and Dad don't like to astral project; they're used to propeller planes, from back in their flying days. (See Mom and Dad in lg pic above, w plane.) So, I don't mind making the trip.

Once the travel day is over and we’re Home Sweet Home, it’s a cozy and comfy class act with little to do except eat, drink and exchange pressies. Cocooning at home plate can be a sweet dish, but it can also come with drawbacks, like forgoing some of those modern conveniences you dig everyday … including the Internet. Wacky, right? Some of you are getting a Christmas sans Internet and don't even realize it, yet. You poor saps. Some parents and grandparents are insistent on collecting those devices or forcing you to turn them off, making certain you all visit properly, ensuring "quality family time" and conversation. Even worse, some will force family-time via Dance, Dance or Alexa-games. 

You think you have it bad, being forced to watch cable TV or compete in Dance, Dance, booze-free, with Grandmama? Try watching your parents foxtrot around the parlor. Dr. Harvey & Hildy are still listening to their old Victrola and beeswax cylinders, making me sit through verse after verse of Yale Boola!, Glow-Worm (in German!), and The Bird on Nellie’s Hat, all whilst viewing the same stereoviews I’ve seen for decades. Bonkers! Don’t worry, fair friends; there are solutions. Yes, most include gin. Ever have a Girlie Martini? No, not Dita von Teese in a giant martini glass … although, yum! A Girlie is equal parts champagne, vodka, a splash of vermouth and a maraschino cherry. Christmas is an excellent time for just such a zinger!

In the end, try to remember it’s family time. If sitting in the tiny house your nonagenarian great-uncle has lived in since the Great War, and consistently heats to eighty-eight degrees, in addition to a roaring fireplace, drives you mad, be patient. When your sister-in-law hands you an apron and expects you to help in the kitchen, even though she knows you don't ever do anything in the kitchen except craft cocktails and make espresso, be kind and oblige. When your neice's boyfriend has no problem telling everyone their political opinions are flat-wrong, just smile and pour another drink.

Ghost-families are no different than yours; they're all equally irritating and annoying ... I mean, fun and annoying. In those family moments, when you realize it's still hours before escaping into town with your beloved and a fave in-law or sibling for cocktails and revels, and you're all sitting around in sweltering silence, staring at each other and picking compulsively from bowls of stale nuts and hard candy …. well, that’s just "quality family time" and you're making someone in that room very, very happy. Drink your Girlie Martini, your Guinness, your I.P.A. or Coppola wine, suck on a pecan and appreciate it in all its absurdity. See you kittens later and enjoy those après-family gatheriings!

Happy Holidays! Abyssinia!

Enjoy craft cocktails? Peruse JennyPop's Festive Libations for The Holidays!

Follow all the holiday cheer @JennyPopCom Insta and Twitter

Published in Miss Hannah Hart

Kids,  I don’t get too much mail here at The Del. Being dead and all, who’s going to send Moi anything? With the exception of occasional postcards you good pips send me here at the Hotel del Coronado -keep ‘em coming, babies!- mail call is pretty quiet around The Del for yours truly.

Still, along with the odd postcard, and some of them are quite odd, especially those from Texas, I do get unexpected packages once in a blue moon. Today, I received a small, padded envelope with a CD in it. There was no note with it, no greeting, merely a crude marking on the CD itself which read, “Consider yourself warned”.

Jeepers creepers! The return address read only “League of S.T.E.A.M.“!

“Supernatural & Troublesome Ectoplasmic Apparition Management, indeed! How rude! I have a right mind to send them a very sternly written letter. However, I am even more of the mind that my online blathering has finally called too much attention to not only myself, but my dear friend Dr. Lucy. It seems to me, we’ve got some ghost hunting types here in the hotel and, what with Hallowe’en fast-approaching, my guess is these steampunk monster hunters are gearing up for Samhain Scandals! Well, they’ll never catch me! Ha ha!

This, btw, is what those real monsters sent me. Pay close attention after the 3:00-mark.

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Damn it, Lucy! I know how much you enjoyed playing with that new EOS Canon Rebel. Still, didn’t I tell you that if we were going to go play at Comic-Con, that we had to lie low? Especially in the SyFy Press Room? As dear old dad, Dr. Harvey, would say, “Oi vey, Lucy!”.

Fortunately, I shall be out of town for the Holidays: home to good ol’ Beantown and spooky Salem, Mass for some Hallowe’en haunting about the Hawthorne Hotel; and, Lucy shall visit her dear Dr. Devorkian up in Napa this All Hallows’ Eve. Let’s see the League of S.T.E.A.M. find us now! (Oh. Wait. Damn it, Hannah!) Well, at least now the League shall have to dispatch their tiresome, hyper-weaponed gnats to New England and Northern California, as well as wherever else their ne’er-do-well activities take them here in Southern California.

Shame on them, nettling and tweaking the likes of Lucy and Moi! Funny enough, now those half-portions in Ghost Adventurers and Ghost Hunters International don’t seem so bad.

Monster hunters take note! Perchance, you are not aware of she with whom you dare to dance! I swing a mean cocktail bag, kittens!

 

Published in Miss Hannah Hart

 

 

“There’s an awful lot of weird, pasty people in here, myself included.” So went my recurring, silent observance throughout this year’s Comic-Con, striking oft as I flitted hither and thither through the San Diego Convention Center, like a frantic mosquito seeking an open window on a muggy, Malibu, summer’s day. The pastiness was not truly what struck me, nor was the definitive weirdness. The real oddity was, like in so many gatherings where we geeks gather en masse -Renaissance Faire, Disneyland- the convergence of and shoulder-to-shoulder conditions pressed upon so many individuals not generally prone to mainstream socializing. Moi? I haven’t left my Hotel del Coronado much since 1934. Dr. Lucy, my ghostie cohort? 1904. Judging by the bevy of pale and malleable bodies endeavouring some severely awkward social interactivity, they’ve not left their abodes since 1904 either. Need more than just one fat Slave Leia? Dr. Lucy’s Comic-Con 2012 Gallery of Oddities!

Cheers, babies! It's me, Miss Hannah Hart, ghostdame of the Hotel del Coronado and it's June! You know what that means? Summer is mere days away and San Diego Comic-Con 2012 is a mere month away!

No one is more excited than Yours Truly ... well, okay. I imagine there are some nibbling their fingernails a tad more than I. After all, part of the appeal of our Comic-Con is that it's in glorious San Diego. I get to live here year round, kids, haunting my dilly of a Hotel Del. If you're zinging your way here for the Con and it's your first time in San Diego, we welcome you, one and all! Need some priceless, insider tips on all the SDCC how-tos? Check the SDCC Expert for Baby's First Comic-Con.

Greetings and salutations, cats! Gorgeous winter days still on the San Diego coast. So lovely, in fact, Dr. Lucy, Little Lindy and I have been whizzing around Coronado Isle in a juicy little breezer some wheat left running outside The Del. Fellow ghosties, want to cause some trouble? If you can get out of your haunt -I can for short bursts- snag a convertible, throw on a scarf and buzz the burg. Coppers won’t know from nothing when they see an empty flivver with nothing but fluttering silk flying down the flug! If you can get to a casino in that breezer for a little hot chocolate and peppermint schnapps (a separate, sipping glass for the schnapps) over a hand or two of invisible poker, even better!

Note to all wheats: don't leave it running! Photo: J.S. Devore

 

Published in Miss Hannah Hart