“It was the boogeyman.”

The Movie: Halloween, 1978 (John Carpenter and Debra Hill, screenplay; John Carpenter, dir.)
Who says it: Jamie Lee Curtis as high school student/babysitter Laurie Strode
The context: Laurie and Dr. Sam Loomis (Donald Pleasance) have just had what they believe to be their final confrontation with the demonic Michael Myers (Tony Moran).
How to use it: To insist you had reason to be scared.

It probably wasn't the greatest idea to read a book about demonic possession right before bed, especially when I'm already fighting insomnia. But when "near-blizzard" winds (I don't know what the dividing line between "blizzard" and "near-blizzard" winds is) woke me up around 2:00 a.m., I was glad to have Dizzy with me for protection.

My apartment building is probably about a hundred years old, although you couldn't tell from the outside. Like most other residential buildings in Gardiner, it's covered with a nondescript siding meant to keep the heat in and minimize weather damage. I live in one of two upstairs apartments; downstairs are one small apartment and two offices.

Before it was a mixed-use apartment building, it was a grocery store. A previous owner bought the building after the grocers went out of business. He gutted the building and remodeled it into its current configuration.

My point, anyway, is that the building is solid. It's been here a while. It's withstood countless winter storms.

But still, as the wind and the snow blasted around us last night, I heard the interior timbers creak, and wondered why the hell anyone lives at this latitude. No, let's be more specific: I wondered why I live at this latitude.

But now it's morning, and everything is blanketed with white, and Dizzy, at least, had a grand time in the new snow.

And the calendar says Spring is only 11 days away.