Esotericism.
Especially since they are in their teens or 20’s now.
Ice cold revenge.
One halloween in the late 1970’s I was living on a hippie organic farm. It didn’t have such niceties as electric lights but we decided to throw a candlelight party and drop acid together. Which acid was just beginning to kick in when our friends started arriving, carrying food and walking up the path in the moonlight. Costumes were not yet much of a thing among US adults, but they had decided to commemorate the holiday by wearing paper bags over their heads.
All dozen of us were seized with a terror that knew no bounds (faceless beings with shapeless brown heads!) and despite our friends’ cries of reassurance, we as one dived out every exit and disappeared into the surrounding countryside. Some of us didn’t reappear until dawn.
I still remember that fondly.
Or when you’re having a leisurely seizure (from all the exceptions to this stupid “rule”).
Or as in all those other words such as deity and atheist… which don’t sound like “a”, at least not the way they were pronounced in that video about Randi coming out somebody posted recently; they pronounced them the way people misspell them.
This was a perfect thread to zombify for halloween.
You pendants ought to be ashamed of yourselves, kicking a man when he’s down.
Don’t make me come down there.
How have we not brought this back for over 10 years?
Because zombies are so 2012.
I feel like I’m in the Twilight Zone.
I just have to say that the ancient zombie OP reminds me of Halloween a great many years ago. A friend had arranged a particularly elaborate setup for the little trick-or-treaters, wherein we all were in costume and had a particular role to perform when each group of kiddies came to the door and were invited in to get their loot. (Heaven forbid that any kids be allowed to enter a stranger’s house these days, but this was long ago!).
It was lots of fun, and the two things I remember were that my assigned role was Dracula, complete with cape and fangs. These folks had an actual organ in the living room – Lord only knows why – and my job was to play ominous music on the organ, and then turn around to face each group of new arrivals, and say, “Good evening!” with fangs glowing in the dim light. The other thing I remember is the older kids being most impressed, but the younger ones bursting into tears with fright and hugging their moms.
How’s does a nice handsome dog like you wear fangs and play the organ without opposable thumbs?
Opposable thumbs are not needed to play the organ or piano, all you need is an adept set of furry front paws! Even a cat can cause a piano to emit sounds by walking across the keys. As for fangs, my goodness, Becky, are you not familiar with the term “canines” as applied to teeth? The very name comes from my species! The Halloween prosthetics were hardly even necessary! 
P.S.- Just to give an idea, but this is not me. I was much more handsome!
What was it … an ocarina made out of a heart or something ?
A lute made from a liver ?
A saxophone made from a spleen ?
Ha, yeah, that’s what I thought as well. I bet they give out full-sized candy bars for Halloween too!
BTW, no diss at the story, which was well-told and very entertaining, but I totally called the outcome by the time I got to paragraph #2: “I bet someone is getting a swift kick to the cajones!”
ETA: Gahh I posted before I realized it was a zombie thread! I feel like one of those idiot victims on The Walking Dead who somehow let a slow-moving, shambling groaning zombie sneak up on them. Oh well, I guess falling prey to a zombie is appropriate to the season.
Well, it was sub-freezing last night with snow and a biting wind, so that put a major crimp in outdoor activities, and the roaming groups of kids who normally Trick or Treat were greatly reduced. It didn’t bother us, though, because our partying was indoors.