A few years back we started a new rule: the house lights go out and candy handout time ends at 8 pm. The neighborhood kids we get (not really all that many YOUNG kids in the neighborhood) are escorted around by an adult starting around 6 pm and tailing off fast. After 8 it was generally teenagers roving far and wide, many not even making a token effort at a costume. Hey, if you’re old enough to be out on your own at night, you can buy your own candy! (Teens escorting kiddos get treats, of course, as long as it’s early.)
WHAT?! Egg dolphinboy, egg dolphinboy!! 
Oops, sorry … 
AH! … … 
No problem. My house has been egged before, and I used to t-pee houses for Halloween when I was a kid. Just keep in mind, I don’t get angry when someone does that to me; I get even.
I’m sure it’ll rinse right off when he plunges back into the water.
Whew! It’s a good thing that I wore the Groucho disguise. 
Unless you wear gloves when you egg someone’s house, your DNA is all over the eggshell. We will find you!
I am SO glad I live in a rural area (fenced property, house set back, gated driveway) where Trick or Treat -ing is not a thing. As much as it was huge fun when I was a kid in the 60s and 70s, I find that as a grown up I really don’t like holidays of any kind.
Yes, I am a curmudgeon, why do you ask?
I used to love Halloween… until all the shitty Brooklyn neighbors moved in. The kids are nice enough… until they come back because “their Momma wants them to have more”. She’s the one eating the kids candy, throwing the wrappers on the ground, and filming her little Donnie Two Scoops asking for seconds. Entitled Brooklyn Scum new neighbors like that make me keep a second bowl of the most disgusting hard candy I can find: Root Beer? Creme Soda? I’ll drop in two and then I turn off the light and shut the door.
Suck It, Brooklyn.
…
Also, since it’s Halloween Season, I guess I can share this: one of the new neighbors, doing a high speed drive by, hit and killed one of our squirrels. It must have been a very heavy sedan or a truck because it didn’t just kill it… it ‘popped’ it. I now have to drive my car to the car wash because half of it is splattered like it was in the movie ‘Carrie’.
( I fucking Love the small critters in my yard too. You fucking can’t drive the speed limit and look where you’re going…? )
“We did a DNA test on the eggs and found the perpetrator.”
Oh, and the good news keeps coming: ICE was at the car wash harassing the people drying the cars.
@Atamasama is the reigning mini-rant thread title champion! I don’t even try any more, I just look forward to each month’s creation!
I think a couple of things play into the no Halloween thing for Mom, but the biggest one is the number of uncostumed teens we get now out looking for candy. I can definitely understand where this concern comes from, since a group of bored teens nearly kicked in our front door ‘for fun’ nearly 10 years ago. (Zero punishment for them, despite the frame being so badly damaged that we ended up having the door insert replaced.) She just doesn’t want more bored teens near the house.
Well, my new fridge has arrived, and the old one hauled away, never to be seen again. The delivery guys had a strange recommendation which Google claims to be true – a newly delivered fridge should sit for a few hours before being plugged in, so that compressor oil and maybe other stuff can settle. Meanwhile I can admire its loveliness, the stainless steel all wrapped in protective plastic. And yes, it opens on the left, which is what I need and seems to be fairly standard.
It has “anti-tip” supports, which are screw-down thingies in front of the front wheels which are supposed to be extended until they touch the floor, but I’m not sure I’ll bother. At my age if I get down that low I may never be able to get up again!
I will also say that I got a taste of what moving will be like. My sole task was to empty the old fridge, throw some stuff out, and put a few things in a cooler chest. I figured it would take about 10 minutes. No. Closer to an hour, with lots of reaching and groaning, with not one but two garbage bags full, heavy enough that I could barely chuck them in the garbage bin. Please, God, if you choose to take me from this Earth, do it before I move!
Bog standard advice since I was a kid. If the fridge spent any time on its side in the warehouse, on the truck, or being carried upstairs or …, the simple gravity feed that lubes the bearings will be starved.
A couple-few hours rest can save 10 years of unnecessary wear that first afternoon.
Well, letting it sit for a few hours is not gonna be a problem. The problem I actually have is that there is so much “protective” plastic wrap going into every nook and cranny that it’s taking me forever to pull it all off. And inside the fridge, every fucking little shelf and compartment is taped with X-tra Strong™ adhesive tape, using I believe the kind of adhesive once applied to the Space Shuttle tiles. 
I ask forgiveness from some of you yung-ons about going on and on about my new fridge, but dammit, I’m an Old Fart who asks nothing more of the world than to be left the fuck alone.
Anyway, after the recommended rest period, the new fridge is plugged in and making refrigerator sounds. I love the bright LED illumination. I have my thermometer in there and in about 24 hours we’ll know what “Recommended” temperature setting means. I like my fridge to be really cold, nearly freezing.
Getting a new fridge is a big fucking deal and this seems to me to be a perfectly cromulent place for such discussion.
And I get what you mean about the plastic cover. A few years back I bought a mini fridge for my bedroom. It was a low-key goal of mine for a long time to have a little fridge in the room, and I kept an eye out for a good deal, and after years of watching I saw a great deal on Amazon and bought one. It has been amazing. I live in a 2 story house, and work from home a good amount of the time, and just the ability to walk over to get a cold drink and not having to run up and down stairs is such a luxury. It doesn’t hold much, really just one 12 pack of soda and then space for a few smallish bottles of something and a few extra cans in the door. And a tiny freezer section that I almost never use, except once or twice when I put something like an ice cream bar in there. But the fridge is big enough for what I need, it’s quiet, it doesn’t take up much room and it’s in a corner out of the way of everything.
The only thing that sucked was the plastic. Not only did I have a plastic film to peel off, it’s clear they put the plastic on before they assembled it. I would have to partially disassemble the fridge to remove it all. It’s insane. There are bolts holding some of the plastic in place, and it even tucks into part of the frame. And it’s not plastic that is supposed to be on it all the time; it’s a shitty thin stretchy crap like kitchen plastic wrap. So I’m forever having to ignore the partial plastic cover part that looks ugly. Luckily, as I said it’s in the bedroom, in the corner, out of the way, so I can ignore it until I need a soda, and nobody but me and my wife ever see it (and my wife never uses it either, she has zero interest, so it’s all just mine).
I now have 6 numbers for the people that installed my solar system on my house.
WHEN I can reach someone (roll of the dice), I come across as a bit aggravated.
They are one of if not the biggest solar installer in the USA.
Their entire phone and communication system is jacked up.
They can’t seem to figure out who the project manager is. Well, one guy told me he was, and then said someone else is. “Call her” That number just leads to a black hole of permanent hold.
I should not be calling them THEY should be calling me. Ya see, the inspection failed. Not so much of a peep from this company.
I need to know when they are going to fix this. Don’t know when I need to be home. I shouldn’t have to chase this shit down. That is their job.
They need to contact ME.