Halloween

I agree with your assessment. Also back then we only got 15 minutes of national news a night. If somebody put a razor blade in an apple in california, we didn't know about it.

 

I embarrassed Emily a few years by handing out candy in addition to small toys - little stuff like finger puppets or mini-plastic spiders or little whistles, etc. She thought that was really lame. I enjoyed it. I do admit I got a few puzzled looks from some of the brats kids. Apparently I wasn't nearly as bad as one family in the neighborhood. They gave out packets of instant oatmeal, toothbrushes, listerine breath mints, coupons ... I think they were cleaning out the pantry or something. ??? :

 

I really don't ubderstand the modern version of celebrating Halloween by begging candy. When I was a youngster, oh so many years ago, we went out and did dirty tricks, sonetimes wearing a mask if we had the dime to buy one at the dime store. A favorite was tipping over outhouses. Next came soaping windows by rubbing a bar of soap on them. Very difficult to remove. another one was making an old thread spool into a noise maker by knotching the flanges. We put this on a spindle and wrapped a cord around it. When pressed against the siding of a house an the cord was givenb a hard pull, it made an awful racket in the house.

One trick was to ring the school bell which was mounted on a tower outside the building. The real trick was to ring it and run faster than the town marxhal who was hiding behind the bushes to catch the miscreants.

How's that for demonic?

 

Yeesh, Phil, you were such a wild man! Ever get caught?

 

Nope, I was either too lucky or too timid to take the big risk.

 

The churches here have huge "Harvest Parties." They have hay rides, prizes, games and all kinds of family stuff. Kids of all ages are invited.

You'd have to know my mother to imagine how big a deal every holiday was. She was an artist and one Halloween, she made a yard full of monsters, witches, devils, ghosts, etc out of some kind of clay compound. They were life size. Several newspaper took pictures of them. She had spotlights on them so they looked extra spooky at night. The little kids wouldn't even approach the house. She had scary music in the background. THEN, she dressed up lika a hobo or tramp or something and kept banging on the picture window where my father was sitting watching tv. He started yelling and cursing at that "big kid" in our yard. He was yelling at my mother to go out and spray him with the hose.

When I would get home with my pillow case full of treats, my mother would go through them, throw out any "suspicious stuff" and start eating the good stuff like Hershey's candy bars. We would eat until we could eat no more. For some reason we would be laughing all the time. Once we laughed so hard, my mother got sick and puked all the candy up on the floor

 

I live in a residential area where only about 1% or less have children,so we don't have children and parents knocking on our doors asking "trick or treat?",but in West Hollywood,a community made up mainly of seniors,Russians and homosexuals,Hollaween night brings out about a hundred thousand homosexuals who dress up in weird costumes and party late into the night.Many streets in West Hollywood are closed.I usually catch the party goers on the T.V.news.The bars are open and the party goers many of which are all liquored up and allegedly having a good time.

 

There are few kids in my neighborhood. I always buy candy, just in case.

 

Your Mom sounds like a hoot Kim!

 

I want a Hershey candy bar now

 

That is hilarious. Your mother sounds fantastic!

 

Barnyardbird, I mean this in the nicest possible way - you seem a little bit like Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino. Kind of crotchety and grizzled - a diamond in the rough.

 

The one house, as trick or treaters, we learned not to go to, was Mrs. Isaacs. That is because Mrs Isaacs would make popcorn balls, you know those sticky things, and when we would say trick or treat, she would deposit popcorn balls into out brown paper grocery store goody bags full of wrapped candy. Needless to say, that made a mess of our goodies. I never could figure out if she thought that was a trick, a treat, or both at the same time.

 

I bet all the kids loved hanging out at your house!

 

looking forward to some demonic candy ;D ;D ;D
As a Wiccan Samhain is the biggest night of the year for me apart from the fact i get to scare the heck out of anyone who knocks on my door i have to make the kids take a handful of candy they only take one little sweet maybe they knew this was cos it was demonic or they couldn't wait to get away from the door ...........i'll be covered in fake blood galore this year......can't wait to scare the neighbours when i go lie in the front garden muhahahahahaah

 

Titus I love your mom! It sounds like she had a good time and shared her love of life with you.

 

And then there was the year that I was a ghost in one of those satin looking, probably flammable costunes. And it rained. So at least I didn't catch fire. But I did get egged by the big bullies in the neighborhood. So there I was, walking back in the house with a wet bag of popcorn ball-laden candy, freezing cold, wet and covered with eggs. That was a halloween to remember. You should have seen my mom when I walked in the door.

 

Let's just say she made life VERY interesting. Probably the most creative person I've ever known. My friends adored her.....probably because she baked a dessert from scratch every day. Some days I'd get home and there were already three or four of my friends eating and being entertained by her.

 

Didn't you hate the ones that gave apples and popcorn balls? Hey, I went out supplied with my own eggs......just in case, of course. Ok, I was a tomboy and always dressed in boy's costumes. Hank, remember Y.A. Tittle (The Bald Eagle)? He played for the Giants in the early 60s. I had one costume with his number on it and made my mother put black under my eyes and carried a football. I must have been 7 or 8 at the time. She stuffed towels in my shirt to make shoulder pads. It must have looked crazy because I had long blonde hair down to my waist and looked like Barbie.