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It was September and cold weather wasn’t far away. Troy decided to convert his wood-burning fireplace into one that burned compressed sawdust chips for the coming winter. He went out to Klegslist looking for bargains on the chips to save even more money on heating his home this coming often sub-zero Michigan winter. He was amazed to find the best deal ever on just the kind of chips his new converter insert burned.

Troy had to be sure the product was good before investing in a truckload of them to be dumped in his converted semi-trailer he was going to be using for storage. He followed his phone’s GPS the sixty miles north, to the sawmill that also made chips out of scrap wood now that there was a demand. Phil met him in the driveway and soon Phil had his chip-burning burner blasting with wonderful heat from the chips.

“One truckload will last through a mild winter, and two truckloads will last through a severe winter for the average-sized house,” said Phil. “Been burnin’ the chips goin’ on three years now.”

“The price of the chips is half of what wood costs me, and there’s no stacking! I’ll take one truckload and get more if needed from you, buddy,” said Troy.

Troy paid in cash, got a receipt, and two weeks later, exactly as he agreed, Phil delivered a truckload of wood chips, easily deposting them in the semi-trailer with his electric conveyer belt.

The end of October arrived. It was Halloween night, and snow fell bewitchingly, as first snows in October do . Troy and Missy, his wife, decided to try out the chips. Just as Troy witnessed at Phil’s place, half as much of them as wood were loaded into the fireplace and soon the house was toasty warm. Feeling self-satisfied they decided to have a few drinks and Netflix and Chill.

As they were “chilling,” Troy looked down at Missy’s face, as he always did, but instead of the face of Missy he saw Minnie Mouse’s face. At the same time, Missy looked up at Troy and saw Goofy’s face. Both screamed at the same time and broke apart and grabbed for their clothes.

The screaming of both continued as when Phil looked at the furniture it looked like a giant twirling teacup and when Missy heard Phil scream he sounded like Donald Duck. Both grabbed for their phones and dialed “9-1-1.”

“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”

Each yelled their answers into their phones, “Disneyland!!!!!!!”

The dispatcher tried to get information from them but got only gibberish.

“Unit 293, we’ve got a 1096 at 123 Main Street, both parties called and both are 1096.”

“Dispatch, send out a couple of ambulances.”

Troy and Missy woke up in hospital beds, strapped in, on the psychiatric nursing unit.

What they learned was Phil dabbled in many money-making enterprises, some more legal than others. The chips that Phil sold to them were a by-product of the manufacture of the latest designer drug, a hallucinogen that always included hallucinations involving Disneyland.

Troy and Missy recovered from their experience. The HAZMAT team had to dispose of the chips. Every Halloween, Troy and Missy flew to a country that didn’t celebrate it, as any sighting of a Disney character gave them flashbacks.

Fandango’s FOWC is bewitching, the Word of the Day Challenge is chip, and Paula’s 3 Things Challenge words are Disneyland, fireplace, zero