Halloween 2023

turn your frown upside down and you could be a glad cow.

Isn’t that a brand of cheese?

Indeed, there is laughing cow cheese and happy cow cheese.

Well, the weather bites. May have up to 2 inches of snow by this evening, but we weren’t going outside anyway. That’s for kids! LoL Going to my favorite watering hole, only folks will be in costume instead of ordinary dress.

My favorite yard display this year was the Ded Zeppelin concert:

Google Photos

We’re going to our usual Taco Tuesday place. Which is Dia del Muertos-themed year round. Not sure how much more ghoulish it can become.

We won’t be dressed up although I suspect the workers will be at least some.

About an hour before sunset now it’s sunny & 87F/31C. Weather not a problem except for anybody foolishly dressed up as Eskimos.

No trick or treaters here, but grandwrex. You get a plain apple and a lecture about teeth brushing from me. The ol’Witch of the Arkansas outback.

The Moms are taking the younguns after school to a fun fair thingy.

Young adults are going on a pub walk.

Me, the ol’Witch and Ivy my groveling ogre will be at home alone. Thank heaven.

I did see a not-so- scary Shadowman. I swear he waved at me.:flushed:

For context:

Went and returned. Wife has a hooded floor length red velour cape which she added to her standard clothes. I went as ordinary me, but told everybody I was a 25yo with an awesome makeup job.

And yes, most of the staff at the Dia de los Muertos place were all gussied up.

As were about 15% of the customers. And about 10% of the dogs.

We’re on a tiny street that used to have twenty kids on it, but they grew up… and we’re down to three. But they each have school posses that may or may not show up.

Since we don’t know if we’ll get seven kids or fifty-seven, we’ve learned to buy treats that we’re willing to liquidate (Peanut M&Ms and Kit-Kats… and Snyder’s makes little bags of really crispy mini-pretzels).

I’d love to chat, but the neighbors are mulling wine and warming up cider with rum, so I’ve gotta go fire up the ol’ broom…

We’re in a family oriented neighborhood, and most years get 50 to 75 kids. This year, we got 1.5" of snow this morning (mostly melted during the day), with a temp of 30F. We got fewer than 25 trick-or-treaters this year, mostly young teenagers. BUT our last group was a bunch of preschoolers whose baskets were just overflowing. On top of the baskets were full-sized, nay, KING-SIZED candy bars. Our nextdoor neighbor was giving them out, so there’s competition for next year.

Perhaps you should buy a fancy new $5,000 kayak “just in case” of flooding?

We’re in a heavy residential area so always get lots of kids.

Set up the Star Wars conflict of good and evil a couple of days ago. Today, put up a big white illuminated spider, fake pumpkins and real jack-o-lantern.

Put the candy in a Storm Trooper candy bowl and a big cloth pumpkin bag, then set them down in front of the steps.

We sat on the steps, drinking our wine, and inviting the kids to take what they wanted from either the Storm Trooper or the pumpkin.

Weather was nice; hovered around 0 C. I put de-icer on the driveway so none of the little ghouls would slip and fall and contact their lawyer-ghouls.

Classic late fall day: grey overcast, smell of woodsmoke, and hundreds of Canada Geese flying overheard, honking away (“time to go south yet? time to go south yet? time to go south yet?”)

Some of the kids said they liked the laid-back approach and being able to choose their own candy. We like the relaxed approach as well. Plus, if we did the more traditional route of the kids ringing the doorbell every five minutes, Piper Mutt goes crazy all evening.

In addition to the traditional costumes (vampires and Spider-men for boys, unicorns and princesses for girls), this year we got several hot dogs and condiment costumes.

Ran out of candy around 7.30, so unplugged the decorations, turned off the flaming porch light, and shut the door.

Had about 75 kids come by tonight, ranging from about 3 yrs old to maybe 15. The last kids were at 9pm. Strangely, almost none of them said “Trick or Treat”. It was all “Happy Halloween”.

Well, thx @needscoffee , that’s creepy enough!

I know what I’ll be dreaming about now. Eeeeekkk!

I think they’re mostly saying

Damn my feet are cold! Damn my feet are cold! Are your feet cold too, Harry? Yeah, Loretta, my feet are friggin’ freezin. Past time, waaay past time, to head South.

But I do miss that sound from when I lived in/under one of major North American migration flyways.

A lot of schools and churches around here have gone to “trunk or treat” gatherings (think Halloween tailgating) and other party-type activities.* Plus, last night was the first night all season where the temperature went below freezing. We had a total of 18 kids, almost all of whom traveled in packs of three to five with parents, and the streets were deserted by 7:45.

*Sometimes it doesn’t work out like it’s supposed to.

We went to Castro Street and caught some of the street party action on Saturday night. My partner was a black-and-orange striped kitty kat, and he looked very cute as one. Me, I put on my brand-new gorilla suit, a tin and tinsel tiara, and a string of fake pearls. Accessorized with the jewels and an 11-inch telescoping cigarette holder, I was QUEEN KONG!. Nobody recognized me though–I got called Harambe (RIP) three times and Mighty Joe Young once.

I disagree, in fact I find that kids tend to squelch the Halloween spirit since you can’t do anything very scary or sexy or topical with kids around.

We had the 1st snowstorm of the year in western Michigan right on Halloween. Dumped a large amount of “lake effect” snow and knocked out power for over a day to most of my area.

Halloween was essentially canceled. :frowning: