The dog standing about eye-level to an elementary school-age child appeared to be leashed as it sipped water on a sidewalk in Dupont Circle. Corrine Johnson quickly learned the dog was only next to the leash, not attached to it.

In one second she saw the dog in the corner of her eye and in the next it had planted its teeth into her right thigh, she says of the July 14 incident.

"I wasn’t even very close to it when I walked by…which was a concern," Johnson says. "Usually a dog if they’re scared or you try to pet it might react like that. But that wasn’t what happened."

Blood immediately formed at the puncture point, and teeth marks stood out on her saliva-covered skin.

Possibly worse than the bite itself was the hassle Johnson endured over several months as she attempted to get rabies shots.

Read More "Shots Mired: Rabies Vaccine Hard to Get in D.C., U.S" »

The ghost hunters show up at the Wayside Theatre in Middletown, Va., during the September run for Unnecessary Farce, a screwball comedy, and before opening night of Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap. They are looking for "George," the so-called "colored usher," who worked in the ’40s at Virginia’s second-oldest professional theater.

George, the story goes, lived and died on a porch just off the second floor that was dismantled during a theater renovation a few months ago. Now George is possibly hanging out at a balcony in an upper section—seat CC1—where he used to sit and watch performances after showing people (black only, this was during segregation) to their seats.

Theater types claim George, or some other ghost, is hanging around in other places as well. The stories they tell involve ghosts lurking among the dress racks in the costume room and creepy feelings of being followed on the stairs.

"Sound is not trustworthy in this booth," says Wayside actress Thomasin Savaiano, the hunters’ tour guide, as she escorts them to the hub of the operation over the stage. "[The monitor will] shut off everything, and it’s entirely rearranged in the morning."

The scene that follows is familiar to anyone who’s watched the plumbers-turned-spirit-catchers on the Sci-Fi network’s Ghost Hunters or those earnest Penn State kids on A&E’s Paranormal State. The place empties out, and the D.C. Metro Area Ghost Watchers haul out their A/V equipment (seven cameras wired up to a central command center next to the snack shop) and wait.

True to TV, they also try talking to the ghost, telling him to move a spindle on the sewing table—"It’s a very light spindle…" This is where the woman of the group, Jan Cunard, comes in. She’s the flirt.

Read More "How to Catch a Ghost: Try Flirting." »