Happy Halloween!

The "How To Host A Murder" Party. A wretched collection of scum and villainy.

The day has arrived! The house is decorated, the creepy music soundtrack all queued up, and Stranger Things is ready to roll on the TV in the living room. Halloween is here!

Honestly, though this is by far and away Lor's favorite holiday, it has not been one of my favorites for a very long time. Normally, I prefer to just stay at home, spend some time on Facebook, check out everyone else's costumes as they attend their Halloween functions, and tell myself that I don't really like these kinds of events anyway.

But, the real problem is that I have always hated how I look in costume. Lor loves playing dress-up and can carry any costume with style and panache. I always felt like an over-inflated balloon that someone had stuffed a costume on. Lor was forever getting after me to participate more fully with her, and last year I told her, if I lost a few pounds by next Halloween, I would participate.

A little bariatric surgery and 88 pounds later, it was time to pay up.

To my surprise, I had a really good time. While Lor put up our giant spider web on the side of the house, I designed our spider-infested front door. (Which has made many visitors very uncomfortable.) We carved pumpkins. We worked together to pick treats for our trick-or-treaters. (Toys and eyeball bubblegum, no candy this year.) Instead of letting Lor do all the work while I grumbled like the Halloween version of the Grinch, I threw myself into the holiday and found out I had been missing an awful lot of fun over the years.

As for our costumes - we were invited to a "How To Host A Murder" party last weekend, set in the 1940s. We got to dress up in period costume, which was awesome. And we looked really great, if I do say so myself:

You handsome devil, you. And Lor looks good too!

Who knew that Halloween was so much fun? Normally I would just sit on the couch with my hand in the candy basket - one for the kiddos, one for me. Not anymore! Now I am out there wearing suspenders and doing...stuff. Yeah, That's me! I am officially converted to holiday participation.

Come Christmastime, No More Threats Of Santa Costumes For Me!

- Hawkwind

Candyphobia

As the days grow shorter and we can begin to feel the bite of colder air, our thoughts turn to the upcoming holiday season. No, not Christmas - what, are you nuts? I still have plenty of time to think about that. No, actually, I refer instead to the most popular holiday in our household:

Halloween.

We are just about ready. The skeletons, pumpkins, and headstones have been pulled out of long-term storage. Lor has made some last-minute additions to our design elements. (See the gigantic arachnids above.) We have even begun looking at costumes, a rare event for the two of us. 

However, a shadow hovers over the household. A frightening subject that we shy away from in terror. A taboo that we desperately wish to break, one step waiting to be taken into the gaping maw of madness.

I am referring, of course, to buying candy for our trick-or-treaters.

In previous years, we would stock up. We get hundreds of trick or treaters at our home, so we would buy huge bags of candy from the local grocery store to be prepared. And we would get the good stuff, too: Twix, Reeses' Cups, Snickers, and Heath bar minis all made regular appearances in our bowl of goodies. No cheaping out on the kiddos for us, no siree.

And, invariably, we would overbuy. So, for a week or two afterwards, we would indulge in the remnants of our Halloween Candy Explosion, until it was finally all gone.

This year - yeah, not so much. The LAST thing I need is a whole lot of candy sitting around the house just waiting for me to eat it. Sign me up for one ticket to Bariatric Surgery Failure Island. Just not going to do that to myself.

So, instead, we have been buying other trick-or-treat items. Toys, stickers, erasers with spooky designs on them. We tried this last year as well. Lor was enthusiastic, I was skeptical. I was positive the kids would hate these little dollar-store items.

Which serves to demonstrate how little I know about kids. The toys were a huge hit - more popular than the candy by far. There are apparently Halloween scouting apps for smartphones that tell parents which homes are giving out the best stuff - and our house got listed as the best one in the neighborhood. Never underestimate the appeal of plastic fangs and spider rings.

However, I can't stand the idea of not giving out more traditional Halloween fare as well, so a day or two before the event we will head to a Family Dollar or something, and buy a big bag of off-brand candy. We will make sure that it contains nothing that we like whatsoever. We will allow each trick-or-treater to pick one piece of our off-brand candy and one toy, and fervently hope that we don't run out. Nothing worse than having to head to the store on Halloween night for an emergency supply purchase.

And, if any candy is left over the next day, we will immediately give it away to someone, so we don't learn to like whatever the remnants are. Prudence, you know.

Repeating "I Will NOT Buy Snickers" To Myself,

- Hawkwind