Call me a Debbie Downer, but I don't do the Halloween thing. For the last 3-4 years we've only had a dozen kids drop by, and they were all 16 years old or older. Like, WTF. Now I just kill all the lights in the house and pretend we don't hear anybody ringing the bell. Last year I thought I'd just leave a big bowl of good candy on the front porch for people to help themselves, and yeah, 2nd group of 17 year olds took it all. Fuck that noise now. Bah humbug.
I dunno, I'm not into home decor but there was a specific wreath that I loved but refused to pay $30 for. That particular store always has a huge clearance section for their seasonal items. I'm patient, and don't mind having bare spaces. Also, I think I use that phrase related to shopping in a very loose way. I would say it is something I wanted and thought about at least 3 times after the fact.
I saw a girl at a college party, wanted her, and thought about her at least 3 times after the fact. And it was definitely lust. So, okay, I'll allow it
Me neither. I haven’t cared about it for a long time. I think part of the reason is that it went from “a little spooky” with ghosts, black cats and witches to full tilt horror with excessive blood and gore. I’ve seen enough blood, guts and brains in real life, thank you. We used to leave a bowl of candy out for kids while we took our boys to a nearby town to trick or treat. Largely because so few houses around here leave their lights on. The last year we did that the bowl was untouched. So we don’t bother anymore, porch lights are turned off. Now that the boys are grown, I can ignore Halloween in peace. Christmas on the other hand…
I'd be happy to do Halloween if kids came, but in the communities I've lived in for the last ~15 years, nobody seems to do that anymore. Even though a couple of my communities were super walkable and family friendly. They've started doing "trunk or treat" where everyone goes to a parking lot and hands candy out of the back of their cars. Which is fine, of course, and probably convenient for parents, but definitely doesn't have the same spirit. We were staying in a rental house on a nice little cul-de-sac a couple years ago, saw kids in the yards every day, tons of families out all the time. I asked our host what kind of traffic they saw so I could buy some candy and the host acted like I was crazy and told me they all drive to a local park and do the car thing.
Weird! We bought a house last year after living in a condo for a while and a shitty apartment before that and I totally underbought candy and had to give away my dark chocolate stash while I sent my husband on an emergency candy run. We have remedied that this year and got about 300 pieces of candy to be safe. There are a few neighborhoods in town that are kind of trick of treating destinations for kids. In one of them the realtors tell you to expect up to 1,000 kids if the weather is decent, which seems like combination fun/annoying/expensive. Trunk or treats are a thing but more poplar in the smaller towns near by. I think they sound terrible but admittedly have never been to one.
I really like Halloween because it’s the one time a year when people pull together and do something nice the community. It doesn’t matter what your race, religion or political beliefs are. Everyone pulls together to make it special for kids. Kids get to dress up as one of their favorite characters. I wish there were more days that pulled us all together for the greater good.
We bought the entire set of Xena: Warrior Princess because we could not find anywhere to stream it. Any doubts about this decision evaporated in the Pinnacle fight scene at the end of episode one. I have to make a clip of this. Xena and her opponent cannot land on the ground or they lose the fight. They are fighting by standing on the heads of the townspeople and one guys shouts "STEP ON ME, XENA!!" I absolutely went blind for 30 seconds. Wheel me off to the urgent care, I think I broke a couple ribs laughing so hard. Xena has a similar campy, ridiculous feel to Evil Dead, but it makes sense since Bruce Campbell was involved in Xena too.
Grew up J-Dub and never got to do the Halloween thing so it was my favorite holiday for a while. Until everyone started having kids. Then they all wanted to take their kids out instead of having too many drinks and making bad decisions. We've been in this house for 6 years and I think we've had a combined total of a ~10 kids so we buy one bag of candy for the 1 or 2 groups of kids that come by.
The piece-de-resistance at our house can’t be seen: we dangle small resl-life-sized spiders from fishing line from the overhead maple trees along sidewalk so they are right at head-level. Little ones won’t hit them, but adults do and the arachnophobes… they SCREAM.
That’s devious. Nice job! What are their reactions after they figure out what you did? Anyone get pissed or do they all take it as intended?
There’s a warning sign at the start. I don’t put that part up all month, just the weekend before Halloween and up until. Fishing line is the secret to everything. It’s strong, super-cheap and at night things look like they’re floating because you can barely see it.
As a fly fisherman I can fully appreciate the science behind monofilaments and their amazing abilities to become invisible and maintain strength.
The following story will illustrate why I never fully commit to anything anymore- I always qualify things by saying “We’ll try to, we intend to “ etc. Because something nearly always fucks up my plans and it’s getting worse as time goes on. This time that something was my wife. We were invited to a Halloween costume party by neighbors at their house. The party was last night. My wife got the invite, but her job has been very busy lately so I took charge and planned our costumes, and bought booze and dessert to bring. I put a decent amount of time into it. We haven’t been to an adult Halloween party in decades, and I’ve always liked putting together a good costume, so I was looking forward to it. Then a few days ago my wife actually reads the entire invite and it turns out there was a theme that our costumes didn’t fit into. So I put some thought into it, bought a few more things and managed to cleverly, in my opinion, pivot our costumes to meet the theme. Yesterday arrived, and my wife decides our costumes will be too hot and/or she doesn’t like them, so she goes to the store and buys two totally different costumes. Only to come home and discover hers doesn’t fit. And she didn’t understand the point of the theme and these new constumes don’t really align with it. So about an hour before we are supposed to leave she has a mini meltdown and we give up altogether. Having spent a couple of hundred bucks on costumes. Instead we go out to eat at a pub, and spend the rest of the night on the couch. Like always. And I’m pissed that I put a bunch of time into this and was looking forward to it.
Halloween, bought to you by the Diabetes Society (blood syrup preserves bodies), The Dental Association (you decay we get pay) and That Creepy Guy from Number 13.
I actually heard a radio ad for a local dentist that was offering to pay kids for turning in their halloween candy. Dentists out here running buyback programs, but for chocs instead of glocks.