Tuesday, October 30, 2007

A Phobic few Days

My desk calendar at work, this year, has been the Year of Fear Calendar by Susie Behar and Tonwen Jones. This handy little calendar offers a brief description of a phobia each day. The days 28th – 30th October all featured potential phobias suffered by vampires.

The 28th was hierophobia – a fear of priests or scared things and asks if it is “the phobia of vampires?”

The 29th was alliumphobia – a fear of garlic, the calendar goes on to inform “Another phobia of vampires? Hanging garlic in the home or wearing it is, of course, believed to give protection from these creatures of the night.”

Finally, the 30th is phengophobia – fear of daylight or sunshine and the calendar asks if it is “yet another phobia of vampires?”

Incidentally, samhainophobia is a fear of Halloween – which I suppose is the ultimate point of this long standing pagan holiday, so long as the fundamental Christian groups don’t get their way! (I typed that bit having watched some Bishop or other, on TV, spouting off about Halloween and how we should veer away from the horror and gore – killjoy.)

The Year of Fear Calendar was published by the IM press and has proven informative through the year, though not as much fun as my 2003 Discworld (reformed) vampires desk diary. The still is from Dracula, Prince of Darkness.

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