And Now, An Important Message

Good evening, my name is Count Dracula. I am also known as Vlad the Impaler. (This was not my first choice of a nickname, but my publicist said it would incite dread in my enemies.) I come here today to expose a disappointing situation from my homeland. Perhaps you have heard about the brouhaha surrounding my Romanian home, Bran Castle?

For those of you who refuse to read Time Magazine - and consider me one of them: pompous claptrap - there is a battle between the current owner of the property, Archduke Dominic von Habsburg-Lothringen, and the Romanian government. It seems that the Archduke has decided to sell Bran Castle before the agreed upon date. Until 2009, it was decreed that my home would stand as a museum.

Can you imagine? A bunch of strangers rummaging through my personal belongings like a band of gypsys? Rubbish! Or worse yet, some stinking American hippie sorting through my undergarments? Bunch of pervs across the pond, I tell you.

Well, apparently, the museum's fate is the current "hot button" issue around these parts. Is that the correct saying nowadays? Back in the early 1900's it was "Bully!" The two sides are now at each other's throats - pun intended - and I have no idea who will be maintaining the castle during the battle. It's not like they have temps to do the sweeping and the mopping! I spent centuries putting my blood, sweat, and tears - as well as the blood, sweat, and tears or countless other victims, er, guests - into this place, and now I have to sit back and worry about a legal battle? What the Hell?

Bran Castle has been my sanctuary, my happy place, for as long as I can remember. Oh, how I love it so. Now, unfortunately, the fate of my home will be decided by the freakin' lawyers.

And they call me a bloodsucker.