“There is magic in the night when pumpkins glow by moonlight.”
The morning is warm. The weather prediction said morning showers then sun. I think I slept through the showers because I can see sun and blue sky. Last night it rained, at times a heavy rain. I went out on the deck a couple of times to keep an eye on Nala, the escape artist. I just hope the branch keeping the fence upright will force Nala to stay in the yard.
When I was a kid, it never got dark early enough on Halloween. We’d try to go out in the late afternoon, but my mother stopped us, “Too early,” she aways said. We had to eat supper first. That made me unhappy for a couple of reasons. The first was I was still home with an empty pillowcase, and the second was I didn’t want to fill up on food. I wanted candy. I wanted to munch as I roamed.
We went all over town. The red house on Main Street, the one with the porch, was a nickel bar stop. I still think of that when I drive by the house. It is now a business of sorts, but it looks the same. We didn’t have the miniature bars back then so candy was often wrapped in a napkin twirled at the top. We also got apples. My favorite apples had a few pennies even the big jackpot, a nickel, pushed to the apple through the peel. I never ate the apples. Fruit on Halloween was wrong, so very wrong. Popcorn was also wrapped in a napkin sometimes with candy corn in the mix. I never liked candy corn, too grossly sweet.
My mother put the costumes together. She also did the make-up. I was a bum a couple of years. I wore tattered clothes and black make-up as if I had a beard. I carried a stick with a bundle at the end. My mask was just the mask to cover my eyes, a usually black mask. It had an elastic connected on both sides of the mask. The elastic often broke away from the mask. I’d have to make a couple of small holes to hold the elastic. Those masks never lasted beyond one Halloween.
I bought Hersey’s candy bars in case my Amazon candy didn’t come in time. That was a mistake. I’ve already eaten two bars.
Amazon came through this morning. I am giving out the regular size M&M’s. The Hershey bars are at the bottom of the plastic blue pumpkin holding the candy. I don’t expect to get down to the bottom of the pumpkin. All those Hershey bars will be mine, all mine!!!
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October 31, 2021 at 3:09 pm
Happy Halloween!
8 p.m., 6 Halloween kids so far at the place where I’m currently located 🙂
October 31, 2021 at 5:06 pm
Birgit,
It is still too early here. I’ll put a leash on Henry so I can keep him from scaring the kids away. He just about scared away the grocery delivery guy. I have M&Ms , the big pack, not the snack pack. I hope I get plenty of kids or I’ll forced to eat it myself!! Such a pity!
October 31, 2021 at 6:06 pm
Hi Kat,
This year we are not celebrating Halloween. We are turning off the lights and enjoying the quiet. Last year we had a few very young kids and we left a bowl at the end of the driveway where it meets the sidewalk.
You know my feelings about the fall and the solstice holidays. I won’t bore you again. 🙂
If the Atlanta Braves win tonight they will win the World Series. It may be the last game in baseball history where pitchers have to bat. All the pundits on TV are saying that the new player collective bargaining agreement will begin universal DH in the National League. I haven’t liked it in the American League since it was instituted in 1975. However, we now give intentional walks without throwing a pitch, putting the last inning’s last batter on second base during extra innings, have umpire’s calls challenged, and who knows what’s next for the greatest game of all. Abner Doubleday is probably rolling in his grave. 🙂 Maybe a separate offensive team and defensive team, or a pitch clock to speed things up even more. I still like the look of sanitary socks long after anyone has put poison chemicals in dyed color socks. Hopefully, these newer ideas will be instituted after I’m long gone. 🙁
October 31, 2021 at 9:12 pm
Hi Bob,
I am happy to celebrate Halloween mostly because I remember how much I loved it as a kid. That’s also why I always buy big bars. This year I had more kids than I’ve ever had. Every one of them was really dressed up for the occasion. The little ones were so cute.
My neighbors gave out candy for the first time since they moved in a few years back. They picked a banner year!
I guess baseball like everything else had to change over time. I’ve liked the DH. I guess because we have been lucky with ours. I don’t like starting with a runner on second in extra innings. Walking a batter without pitching to him makes a lot of sense. Baseball can be soooo long and boring. The Pawtucket Red Sox, formerly a AAA farm team of the Sox, played the Rochester Red Wings in the longest game in history: 33 innings which took 8 hours and twenty five minutes of playing time.
I doubt they’d ever be an offensive team and defensive team. In football the jobs of the offense and defense are particular but not in baseball. Perhaps a pitch clock might help given the pitchers who try to throw off the rhythm of the batters by taking so long between pitches.
I also still like the look of the stirrups over the sanitary socks. Without them, who would the White Sox and the Red Sox be?
October 31, 2021 at 10:39 pm
Watching the World Series and Major League Baseball doesn’t have the gonads to get rid of the Atlanta team’s nickname and the stupid chop cheer. Cleveland chose a new name and they are being sued by a roller derby team who had the name Guardians. Many of the players wear their pants down to their shoes and you see no socks at all.
When I was in high school my cousin and I went to a Sunday doubleheader at Shea Stadium between the Mets and the Giants. We left after the fifth inning of the second game. When we got home the game was still being played on TV. 🙂 That’s real baseball.
“Willie Mays Keeps Mets Awake With Legal Larceny; Giants Top Mets Twice as 7‐Hour‐23‐Minute, 23‐Inning 2d Gamne Sets Mark; NEW YORK DROPS 5‐3, 8‐6 CONTESTS; 57,037, Season’s Top Crowd in Majors, Attend Games—Mets Make Triple Play
https://www.nytimes.com/1964/06/01/archives/willie-mays-keeps-mets-awake-with-legal-larceny-giants-top-mets.html
October 31, 2021 at 10:47 pm
Wow, that was a spectacular game. I love how the author kept describing the innings as game 1 and game 2. The diehards who hung around the whole game should be applauded.
I agree about the Atlanta team name and the cheer, but it is Georgia after all!