Autumn and Halloween

[Yaish]

What a great thread. Thanks for starting it Jamie.

Halloween is also my favorite time of year. I love the cooling temps, the changing leaves, the crisp smell of cold northern air on the wind.
Hot apple cider, cold crisp apples, and the wind sighing in the trees outside. As a matter of fact, we have the first fire of the season in the fireplace right now.

I remember the costumes my grandmother used to make me. One year it was a full body monkey costume, complete with a stiff, curled tail. She had dismantled and old faux fur coat for material and put the whole thing together for me. Another year it was "swamp creature", replete with dangling bits of moss and algae.

Now it's more house parties (one this Saturday) and handing out candy. Of course there is also helping the niece and nephew put their costumes together. (she is going as a mermaid, my wife is putting it together. The boy wants a store bought costume unfortunately, but he's at that age ya know)

[Jock Scot]

Wow!What fun you chaps seem to have--------I seem to have missed out on all this!

[Makeitstop]

This is a bittersweet time of year for me. It's just starting to cool off, and as soon as I finally start feeling comfortable, my body awakens from it's summer dormancy and my metabolism skyrockets, causing my body to pump out unbelievable amounts of heat. It will be some time before it is actually cold enough outside to feel comfortable, and by then I will be so warm that I cannot remain inside without overheating.

It's also that time when Halloween comes around, which is not what it used to be. As a young child, Halloween was disappointing in many ways, as I always had a crappy costume, numerous restrictions, and the dangers posed by larger kids in the neighborhood who liked to ruin things by intimidating and robbing small children. But all of this was overshadowed by a pillow case full of free candy which would be traded and horded and slowly consumed for days if not weeks.

As I got older things improved greatly. We moved to a better neighborhood, and I was able to finagle some real costumes, either renting or gathering them bit by bit for weeks in advance. I loved my ninja costume most of all, as I got it the year that everyone else went as ninjas. Not only could you go back to the same house more than once, you could circle around back in a group and get a second piece of candy in the same trip (I come from a family of thieves, grifters and lawyers, so my sense of right and wrong took a while to develop).

When I got a little old for trick or treating, I started going down to state street for the annual Halloween party (before it became the annual Halloween riot) and would wear a caricature mask of a certain president who was popular in that city, and would have friends and props which lampooned whatever his most recent scandal was at the time. When that got old I started going to a party which was only vaguely Halloween oriented, but gave me a chance to hang out with busy friends and come up with really creative, cheap, and often absurd costumes.

The past several years Halloween has been disappointing for one reason or another, though most of the time it has at least something do with a woman. But I think it also has to do with the fact that I just don't feel the Halloween atmosphere living in a cheap apartment building filled with college students where I have little ability or reason to indulge in the festivities, and where the only sign of Halloween will be the aisle of cheesy crap at wal-mart and the change in programming on the old idiot box. All I plan to do this year is to go to a costume party, and it's probably not going to be a very good one.

I miss Halloween. I miss carving pumpkins with my grandma. I miss taking the rotten remains of those pumpkins out back and blasting them to bits with a shotgun after Halloween was over. I miss trying to talk stores and restaurants into giving out free stuff just to see if it would work. I miss trading away anything with caramel for that last peanut butter twix. I miss pulling elaborate pranks on my friends, or even just dressing in black and popping out of a tree. I miss driving my teachers insane with arguments about how it was discriminatory and hypocritical to allow Halloween and ban other holidays. I miss looking down on the phony creepy and scary stuff being promoted as I dived head first into the real stuff.

I suppose someday I may get Halloween back. Until then, I'll just have to survive with what I've got.

[auld argonian]

Wow!What fun you chaps seem to have--------I seem to have missed out on all this!

I'm always surprised that Halloween doesn't happen all around the world. A couple of years ago we had a contingent of city planners from Canberra visit. We live in a Walter Burley Griffin house and WBG is a big noise down under...he did the plan for Canberra and some of the government buildings. We set out a buffet lunch, popped a couple of beers, ate and went out to walk around and look at the WBG houses in the neighborhood. The Aussies were blown away by the big to-do about Halloween...I guess I made the assumption that it was celebrated in like fashion all over but this was new for them. There was talk about them delaying their return so that they could come back and be with us for Halloween proper and see the kids coming around and help pass out treats..they really couldn't stay, though.

If any of our Xsmarks friends are thinking about visiting (and taking advantage of that exchange rate...), autumn isn't a bad time and Halloween is increasingly becoming a city-wide celebration here in Chicago. I'll try to get some photos of the big Halloween parade that happens here on a Saturday before the holiday. The city has erected a Halloween Village in the City Hall plaza and there are tents for vendors much like a Christmas Market only for Fall stuff and masks and things. The parade features members of one of the local experimental theatre companies who create outlandish costumes and huge spooky puppets for the event.

One other thing about the parade is that it features local TV late-nite horror movie hosts riding in convertibles and waving to the crowd. Don't know if you folks in Euro-land have these but we have a tradition of local late night television programming where they run an old horror flick and it's hosted by someone dressed as some kind of ghoul or vampire who introduces the movie and does schtick between segments. SCTV spoofed it beautifully with Count Floyd played by Joe Flahrety.

http://sctvguide.ca/programs/monster.htm

Best

AA

[Colin]

I love everything about the Autumn.

The leaves falling, the trip to the apple orchards, the kids running around the pumpkin patch frantically looking for their perfect pumpkin, the crisp-ness of the air, Halloween, my wife's birthday, the start of curling season, crunchy leaves and kids playing in them......

This is definitely my favourite time of year.

[Clockwork John]

I love this time of year... The changing temperature, the fact that it finally rains once in a while... I love being able to break out jackets and boots and scarves and hats... these are some of my favorite things to wear. Also, I'm reminded that my birthaday is just a few weeks away.

[Arlen]

Autumn is a wonderful time of year. It's my favourite season. A time for looking inward, releasing the old year and preparing for the new.
Without going into my religious beliefs about autumn and samhain, I am just happy to experience it.

Plus, it always feels great to wear a kilt in the Scottish autumn.

[rmmcscott]

I too love fall/autumn... the Halloween stuff is ok... I enjoy seeing kids (even though I have none of my own) enjoying themselves in their costumes, just about as much as I enjoy watching my friends in their more elaborate costumes!

I on thing I miss the most is the homemade popcorn balls that always awaited us at my Grandmother's farmhouse... chewy, sweet, delicious - I can almost taste it today! It was always a treat to go out to the farm and get those popcorn balls, and all the kids in the area came for popcorn balls... even the long-time neighbors came around with their grandkids because she'd been doing them for so long - it started when my mom was small and they couldn't afford a bunch of candy for the kids in the area (not to mention they had 6 kids of their own), popcorn was cheap and making popcorn balls was easy. My grandmother is 84 now, and I should ask her to make the popcorn balls for my niece and nephew!

Anyway... Makeitstop, make your own halloween - invite some of your friends and have an "old-fashioned" halloween. Make it a night in with a jack-o-lantern, some homemade goodies, and good friends!

Scott

[Jock Scot]

Autumn is a wonderful time of year. It's my favourite season. A time for looking inward, releasing the old year and preparing for the new.
Without going into my religious beliefs about autumn and samhain, I am just happy to experience it.

Plus, it always feels great to wear a kilt in the Scottish autumn.

What a superb autumn we are having,the hills are magnificent and the leaves on the trees on the lower slopes are almost up to American standards with their colours.A vintage autumn for us-----and no midges.The deer on the hills are in the best condition that I have ever seen,I just hope that does not bode ill for the winter.Yes, a great time to wear the kilt.

[pdcorlis]

Anyway... Makeitstop, make your own halloween - invite some of your friends and have an "old-fashioned" halloween. Make it a night in with a jack-o-lantern, some homemade goodies, and good friends!
Scott

Amen - all traditions have to start somewhere - why not start some of your own today?