Is there a mashed potato phantom in Mississippi?

Unless you live in Idaho, it's likely not often that you hear ghost stories about potatoes, but there seems to be a supernatural spud spectre at large in Jackson, Mississippi.

Star reporter Margaret-Ann Carter of WJTV-12, Jackson's Local News Leader, has filed a mind-blowing report about a mashed potato mystery unfolding in the neighborhood of Belhaven - an area known for its quirky activities, according to resident Jordan Lewis.  She found herself an unwitting victim of the potato phantom when she discovered a styrofoam bowl of mashed mysteriousness had been placed on the hood of her car. After some investigation with her neighbors, there were also reports of taters teetering on porches and mailboxes as well.

"We don't know if someone's just playing a prank or someone just had a lot of leftovers," Lewis said. "We're not quite sure."

Left unspoken is the very real possibility that this is an improbable invasion from the spirit realm.

Sebastian Bjernegard, another Belhaven resident who nearly stepped into a bowl of mashed potatoes on his doorstep, offered up a more sinister concern about the spectral side dish that spread on social media. 

"Some people were thinking that maybe the mashed potatoes were poisoned to kill animals," he said. "I didn't taste it. I have a three-second rule so I didn't touch it, but some people were worried."

While that idea of a murderous Mashed Potato Maniac on the loose is certainly horrifying, as that hypothetical poison could likely kill people as well, the fact that no one is reported to have actually sampled the distressing dishes means that no one can confirm nor deny that these might not be mashed potatoes at all, but rather bowls of ectoplasmic residue from the Great Beyond.

Ace reporter Carter tells us that the quirk-hardened residents of Belhaven apparently view this potential incursion from the afterlife as so "harmless" as to not warrant contacting the authorities. Perhaps they have their own traveling van of spectral sleuths on the case already, or would like to avoid having their memories erased by the government's men in black. More on this pernicious potato phantom as it percolates.