The Haunted Sewing Machine

I'm not sure what to believe about hauntings, but whether I believe they are real or not, they still freak me out.  I willingly attribute any strange noises in my house to the kids or the creaks and settling of a hundred-year-old structure. I don't even like walking on the same side of the street as the empty building where paranormal investigators visited and their findings were inconclusive.

So, the other day, I actually had a chance to sew. The little one woke up from her nap before I was finished, so I left everything out, figuring I would be back to it in a few minutes. (Yeah right.) I finished changing he diaper and was getting ready to send her outside (it being the weekend and she would have as much Daddy-time as possible) when I heard my sewing machine running.  Not the easy pace of someone carefully sewing a seam, but the full-bore "I'm fleeing the police" kind of speed.  With the knowledge of what it feels like to have a needle go through my finger, I yell to my daughter to stop playing with it, though I couldn't remember hearing her come downstairs.  I rushed to the sewing machine to find it whizzing away with nary a visible soul around it. I yanked the plug from the extension cod and the machine stopped, the air filled with the scent of hot electrical.

My husband inspected everything quickly and said it was fine to keep sewing. His only stipulation was that I should unplug it when not sewing.  (I took this to mean when I was going away from the machine for more that five minutes.) I sat down to pin the next seam and the machine started running. I unplugged it. It stopped. I plugged it back in, ready to sew.  It was zooming along before I even got the plug all the way in.  Before I could yank it out, there was a pop and smoke from the back of the machine.

I suspect this is more of an electrical issue rather than a haunting of my sewing machine and further investigation resulted in a possibly faulty extension cord.  But the moments I thought I was witnessing paranormal activity sent my pulse racing as fast as my sewing machine needle.

I'm just going to believe it was all electrical. Please don't tell me otherwise.