The Halloween Decorating Police Game

I can’t believe it’s almost Halloween already. I mean that in more of a figurative way than a literal way. If I meant it literally, I’d be lying because the Halloween decorations began creeping into stores in early September and my neighbourhood has slowly become one long string of “who has the best fake cemetery” and “Who can hang the most ghosts, zombies, skeletons and Frankenstein’s Monsters from their porch.”

Also, there are the giant inflatables. I remember when they started popping up. It used to be just for Christmas. The first one I saw was pretty nifty- it was a giant snowglobe with a polar bear in it and a fan blew the snow around. Then they became more popular and there were trains with waving penguins and santas, reindeer popping out of presents and variations on the giant snowglobe theme.

Then, of course, they stopped being just for Christmas and giant Easter bunnies began cropping up. There were giant turkeys for Thanksgiving and, of course, the Halloween versions. The Halloween versions are actually exactly the same as the Christmas versions except there are ghosts and pumpkins instead of santas and reindeer. Oh, and they’re orange and black instead of green and red. I even saw the “Halloween on a train” inflatable yesterday. Do ghosts and ghouls really ride trains and wave at people? I think not.

I prefer the more gruesome Halloween decorations myself. Someone in my neighbourhood has decorated their cemetery as a crime scene. There are fake evidence numbers scattered around bloody body parts which seem to stick out of the ground. Naturally, I find this quite funny. Hey, if you haven’t figured out I’m a little dark and twisted yet, you clearly haven’t read enough of my blogs. I especially appreciate the touch that they have a decaying corpse watching over the entire scene and he looks disturbingly real.

I enjoy this time of year. It makes walking the pups in the evening even more fun. Our neighbourhood is clustered into batches. There are Those Who Decorate and Those Who Do Not Decorate. If one house decorates, those around it tend to at least place some token decorations outside. Then we’ll walk for a stretch into an area of Those Who Do Not Decorate. These are the boring houses. As daft as it sounds, I like to mentally grade houses on their efforts. It serves no purpose other than to allow myself a little extra amusement while the pups sniff and scamper their way on our walks.

My grading system is easy. A house gets points for efforts. If it’s a really well done decorating job, they get top marks. If they’ve at least made an effort, we take that into consideration. If not effort is made, they FAIL. Nothing much happens except I whisper to the pups that “We have a FAIL on our hands, girls!” They pay no attention to me because there are squirrels to chase and, frankly, when there are squirrels to be chased, a quirky ‘mother’/’owner’ is really not important enough to merit paying any attention.

I’m very generous with my points though. Even if a house has a mere single pumpkin on the porch, they get to scrape a ‘pass’ from me. I mean it’s something. We do take chrysanthemums into consideration too since they are a traditional autumn flower. If a house has a spectacular display of mums that was clearly planted with love and attention, we give them a pass. If they have a token dying chrysanthemum in their flower garden that’s clearly an afterthought, they don’t necessarily pass.

It’s a silly game but I enjoy it. One of my favourite houses is the one where the little old lady has a toy cat in the window and she dresses it in little outfits for the seasons. It has Easter bunny ears, an Uncle Sam hat and now it has a witches hat and cape. She also has a lovely display of Jack o’ Lanterns and some pretty mums. She gets high marks. It’s all about the effort and there’s bonus points for cuteness. I’m not a cat person but I adore her stuffed toy cat because you can tell she has fun with it and what’s life if you can’t have a little fun with it?

I also play the game at Christmas too although it’s usually a little colder and harder to linger. I like to grade the Christmas displays. I know that’s not politically correct because not everyone celebrates and there may be a reason there isn’t a shimmering display of Christmas lights out front but this is why I only grade the houses that do participate. Also, we grade on indoor decorations too so if there’s a particularly pretty tree inside the house but no outdoor decorations, it’s pretty obvious they’re celebrators of Chrismas and it’s ok to grade them.

I am aware that this is probably a peculiar habit and there’s absolutely no point at all. I have visualized forming a squad of Decorating Police but I think I’d be the only member and it would be rather odd to walk up to people and say, “By the way, your scarecrows are dirty and leaking straw. I think it’s time to get some new ones. Also, you have too many ghosts and not enough zombies.” It would be sort of entertaining but as I always say, I do like to keep up some attempt of normalcy with my neighbours.

Halloween is only the beginning. There will be some giant inflatable turkeys popping up over the next few weeks and they will soon be succeeded by all manner of holiday inflatables and lights. I have to admit, I’m looking forward to it. Walking with the dogs is always a nice way to get out and about but it’s even more fun when I can play Undercover Decorating Police.

Happy Wednesday!

Visions of Fridays Dance in My Head

I think I've said before that I like Thursdays as a general rule. I find them akin to Christmas Even where you know the 'big day' is next but the anticipation of that is almost as sweet as the actual day of Christmas itself.

In this case, the 'big day' is simply Friday. While we still have to work on Fridays, they're like the reward at the end of the week. Things are a little more relaxed. People talk more on Fridays. The day goes by quickly, mostly because I have a lot of meetings on Fridays for some reason.

As not a huge fan of meetings, I don't mind meetings on Friday afternoons, particularly when they involve my boss. He's very easily distractable and clearly has a case of the 'wanting to escape early and start the weekend off right.'

So, pretty much, in a way, Fridays are part of the weekend because you know how matter how rough they are, there are two beautiful days of freedom just beyond the rise.

Today was a good Thursday. I had a couple of meetings which weren't too bad. I find that I tend to doodle a lot more in some meetings than others. Doodling, for me, is almost like meditation. I have to doodle in order to listen. As my pencil sketches odd designs and things on the page, my mind is listening to what people are saying.

Today, my doodles were off odd things. I drew a superhero who was an owl, two large evil looking pumpkins. Then I attempted to sketch a piece of corn. I don't mean the sweetcorn you buy in the supermarket, it was the type of corn that looks like wheat, that they make into flower. In England, when you see a corn field, there's no sweetcorn to be found. Instead it's rows and rows of green or golden sheaves, depending on the month, waving in the wind.

This is the corn I grew up with. My older brother used to go off to the corn fields to get up to mischief with his friends. They'd play in the fields, hiding from one another when the corn was high enough. When it was harvest season, they'd use the haystacks made from the dried corn stalks as objects in which to dive.

In our art classes, we'd have to draw pieces of this corn, capturing each kernel just right. Nowadays, while I remember in my mind how it looks, my pencil can no longer remember how to sketch it. It was sad. I used to know how to nest each kernel so it actually looked like corn. Now it looks rather bloated and more like a Christmas tree.

I was a little worried about this, whether it meant I was losing some of my Englishness. I compensated by making sure I could still remember how to make the pound sign. I don't mean that crosshatch thing you see on phone keypads, I mean the UK monetary type of pound sign. Fortunately, I could without any thought at all.

Thus, my meetings passed quickly. I like it when that happens. Doodling is good for making sure you're not so bored you start visualizing stabbing people in the eye with your pencil.

In addition to my meetings, we also had cake. I'm not a big fan of cake but today I was in the mood for a piece. My piece had plenty of frosting on it and clearly, I was in the mood for that more than cake because I realized that I'd slowly eaten all of that and left part of the cake. That's unusual for me. I'm not usually a cake eater at all.

I also had a meeting with the man who interviewed me last week. I was offered the job I interviewed for. At the moment, I'm 98% sure I'm ready for the change since the salary and benefits package met my requirements. All I need is the formal offer from the company which I'm supposed to get tomorrow.

The prospect of this change is both exciting and a little scary. I like this new company. People there seemed genuinally to like their jobs. Having been involved in a series of candidate interviews for a programmer position we have at work, I've had the chance to be on both sides of the interview process over the past two weeks. You can tell when someone is genuinely excited about their job. I don't think many people in our company are. In this new company, three of the four employees have been there over ten years. That says a lot.

I may change my mind but it's a lovely feeling to go into my Friday with this opportunity on my mind. It will help me focus on my current job and truly decide if I want to leave or whether the new opportunity is too great to pass up. I suggest the latter but I want time to sleep on it and make absolutely sure it's the right thing for me.

For now, I have that and the pleasure of it being Friday tomorrow. The weekend is wide open at the moment with no firm plans. It will give me plenty of time to do some serious thinking so that, by Monday, I will know for sure.

Then again, I have several meetings tomorrow. Maybe I should use those as my thinking time instead.

We'll see how it goes.

Happy Friday!

Paranormal Activity and Hopeful Thinking....

It's Monday morning and I'll skip all the whining about how I wish the weekend was longer and how much I hate Monday mornings. This is no exception; the very first thing I discover when I get to work is that a project that I was told would be mine is, once again, now under the management of my coworker. I know I should probably be glad that this means I don't have to work as much as she does but when I go to your boss and tell him repeatedly that I really, really want more projects, it's very frustrating to NOT get new projects. I'm also trying not to take it personally but...well...we know that's not going to happen.

Thus, I'm going to continue with my attempt to be positive today even though the day has started a little on the sour side. It's not my coworker's fault: Either I'm too incompetent to be allowed to work on projects or she's just such a superstar they can't do without her. I'm going with the second option. It allows me to spend the time working on projects I can create myself. I don't need any guidance, right? It's all up to me. Uh, yay?

I did have a nice weekend, however. On Saturday, I decided to go to the movies. It's been a long time since I last saw a film in the theatre and that used to be my main form of entertainment. Since it's near Halloween, I saw, "Paranormal Activity." It's one of those Blair Witch type movies that's filmed with a "home" video camera and acts like it's all real. The reason I saw that one was because I haven't seen a really scary movie in a long time and that one was being hyped as 'terrifying'.

Well, I admit, there were some moments in the movie that were genuinely creepy. It's basically about this young couple who live in a really, really nice house. The girl is a student and the boy is a day trader. I don't know what kind of day trader he is but they live in San Diego and that kind of house is EXPENSIVE. Anyway, the girl has been hearing things in the house and strange things have been happening so the boyfriend goes out and buys a camera so they can record it. Because, you know, that's what you do when you think you're being haunted. You buy a camera. You don't, you know, contact Ghost Hunters or anything and watch them squeal with terror, even though they're supposed to be the experts. The whole movie is pretty much what they capture on camera, particularly while they sleep. As the movie progresses, more and more creepy stuff happens.

The problem I had with the movie is that it's the slow, small things that happen that are the creepiest. These things are doors moving by themselves, keys appearing in the middle of the floor...that type of thing. Yet, as the movie goes on, the creepy moments get bigger and grander and when you find out what's causing them, it's almost laughable. The couple are the only characters except for a psychic who comes in and some random friend of the girlfriend's. As the creepier things get bigger and more obvious, the boyfriend tries things like putting powder on the floor to see if there's footsteps or using a Oujia board to talk to whatever's causing the disturbance. Not, at any time, do they consider NOT sleeping in the house until the very end. NOT at any point do they consider calling someone who can help until they're at their most desperate. NOT at any point do they say, 'this is weird!'. I mean, they can see what's happening when they play back the video but even though the girl acts scared, she doesn't really seem THAT bothered. If she was, why does she wait until the last minute to try to get help?

The movie concept is that this is a real couple, not actors. This REALLY happened to them. It's creepy, I admit but, at times, it's just plain silly. As soon as I found out it wasn't just an ordinary haunting, I felt like the movie was ruined. I suppose they were trying to build the movie using classic structure- build up, action...climax. Except, I think it would have been more effective if you never found out what it was, it would have been more realistic if they made it more 'real life' and less "we're gonna scare the crap out of you." I don't know about you but there are often little moments when I've been in a house, apartment, wherever and I notice a door open that i don't remember opening or a light on that I don't remember turning on. Given my overactive imagination, that's enough to give me the creeps. I don't need some silly explanation or some major drama, a good old 'real' ghost is enough.

I'm trying not to spoil the movie in case you want to see it. I could comment about the silliness of the footsteps, for example or the Ouija board scene. I will say that, at one point, the girlfriend says, "it's no good! It can do whatever it wants!" or something to that effect. It does seem that the paranormal activity CAN do what it wants. The thing I wanted to know is WHY was it doing what it was doing? If what it wanted was what happened at the end of the movie, why the heck didn't it just do it in the beginning? What on earth did it gain from what it did?

I suppose, as I said with the zombies in an earlier post, I like to know why something does what it does. I just like my creepy creatures and phenomenons to have a purpose. Even if it had been to drive the annoying girl and her annoying boyfriend crazy, that would have been enough but, alas, we don't even know that much.

Anyway, aside from that, I spent the weekend carving my annual pumpkins and watching "Harry Potter," because that's what you do when you carve...you watch "Harry Potter." I did three this year since I found three different sizes and decided I needed a pumpkin family. I have a daddy who has a moustache, a mummy who's a vampire and the baby who has his dad's eyes but his mother's fangs. It was fun to carve them.

The rest of my weekend was pretty uneventful. Sometimes they're the best ones. I did, once again, secretly hope that something would happen and they'd have to close the office today but, alas, that did not happen. I do, however, live in hope and hope is positive and I'm trying to be positive. So, it all works out rather nicely. At least...in my head.

Happy Monday!

Imposter Chocolate and Other Miscellaneous Thoughts...

It's still gloomy outside. Today, due to the incredible level of humidity, we're supposed to have fog that is 'fluid'. This means that the fog is moving all over the place and might not stick around. To me, this seems to be a bit of a weather cop-out. It's a creative way of saying "there's fog in some places but if you don't see any, it might be pop-up fog". Can fog really 'pop up'? I sort of envision fog more...creeping in, rolling in across the land. I would be rather alarmed if I was driving and suddenly there was fog right where there was none moments before.

Nah, I think it's really just another way of saying, "it might rain!" Thanks, Mr. Weatherman, as always, you've been most helpful.

It's been an overall gloomy week outside. My lawn is slowly growing and, while it isn't wet, it's damp and soggy and the mosquitoes are thick and eager. I cannot go outside and return without a bit. I do wear repellent but I think that mosquitoes are becoming immune to repellent. I tried not to venture out much last night but it's rubbish day in the 'hood so I had to drag my bin to the curb and take out the recycling. Fortunately, I dodged every bite but one.

I think the weather outside takes its toll on people inside. You can always tell when it's been bright and sunny because people are more alert, more friendly. With the oppressive gloom, people seem to keep more to themselves, finding themselves weighed down by the heavy humidity and the burdens of life.

I've been trying to fight the gloom. It's hard, I admit. My house is not terribly airy when it's muggy outside. As a ranch style house, the windows are all along the outside and the centre of the house has no air flow. My living room windows have no screens so I don't open them. It makes it warm in the evenings but as I said yesterday, it's just a little sticky but not sweltering hot as it was a month or so ago.

Of course, according to Mr. Weatherman we are supposed to see cooler weather during 'the second half of the weekend.' Unfortunately, he followed this by saying, "so, by Tuesday, temperatures should be lower." How, exactly, he interprets Tuesday as "the second half of the weekend," I'm not too sure but, as I always say, he's the Weatherman and his ways are a mystery to me. I think I'll keep it that way. It keeps me entertained in the mornings and helps wake me up as I try to puzzle his strange phrases such as "impulses of rain," "fluid fog" and "pop-up thunderstorms."

Ah well, we're in that strange phase that happens between seasons. It's not cool enough to be Autumn but the days of summer are behind us. Summer is struggling to hold on so it's bringing humidity and warmth but Fall is just beyond the horizon, still changing the colour of the leaves and dropping them from the trees and proving its arrival by giving us pumpkins in the supermarkets, on roadside stands and on the porches of those that don't mind replacing them regularly until Halloween.

This year, I'm quite excited that I live in the type of neighbourhood where people put out pumpkins. I have a strong feeling I'll get a lot of trick or treaters this year because there a ton of kids in the neighbourhood. That's going to be fun...I think. Of course, it means a financial investment in the treats because no-one wants to be known as 'the lady who gives out crappy candy at Halloween.' To me, this means those nasty peanut butter kiss things in the waxy orange and black wrappers and Tootsie Rolls. I know, I know, some people like Tootsie Rolls. To me, they're impostor chocolate. You reach for them when you really crave chocolate and...they fail you. If I'm going to eat chocolate, I want a Cadbury bar, not some nasty chewy fake chocolate thingy that takes longer to unwrap than to eat.

The fruity Tootsie Rolls are an exception. I like those but that's because they don't pretend to be something they're not. They just are fruity goodness in the form of a chew. Kind of like Starbursts. I love Starbursts which used to be called Opal Fruits in England but are now also called Starbursts. The only thing I don't like are the grape ones. This is because the first time I ate one in the U.S., I saw the purple and assumed, like in England, it'd be blackcurrant which is one of my favourite flavours. Not so. It was a nasty grape one. The same also goes for watermelon. Watermelon and grape flavours rarely taste like the real fruit. Thus, I shun them because they're vile.

So, obviously, this is one of those blogs where I just start typing and I end up babbling. I hope that's ok. Even if it's not, it's not like I'm going to erase it and start over. I would, actually, except I have a meeting at work. This will most likely be a meeting that irritates me because it's going to end up trying to give me more work to do that shouldn't fall to me but I'm going to be an optimist and hope for a better outcome. At the very least, it'll give me a chance to doodle. I love to doodle. It helps me focus during meetings.

Sorry for the ramblings. Wish me luck on my meeting. As always, thanks for reading.

Happy Thursday.

Let's Not Deck the Halls Just Yet...

So, it's Friday. It's all gloomy outside, as though the sky is thinking about raining but doesn't quite have the energy to do so. It's like all mornings at the end of the week where your alarm goes off and you think, "five more minutes," and roll over, trying to get up the energy to sit up and eventually crawl out of bed. Not that weather has an alarm clock...but you get the idea. It's supposed to rain a lot today. I'm going to my parents tonight and it's supposed to snow there, even though it's a mere two hours north.

But it might be good for it to snow. You see, apparently, it's almost Christmas. I know this because my TV tells me so. I've never made a secret of the fact that I watch a fair amount of television. I have my regular shows for the week. I've also told you that I don't have TiVo. I actually don't have cable. I also have to get one of those digital converter box thingies. I even got the $50 credit towards it. Note to self: Buy digital converter box.

Anyway, so, without TiVo, I tend to watch most of my shows live. Which means I also watch the adverts- or commercials- depending on which side of the ocean you're from. Now, I actually don't mind watching commercials, especially now the damn election ads are done. (Hooray for that, by the way). I enjoy the PC/Mac commercials because I'm a bit of a geek and they make me laugh. My favourite one is the one where the PC demonstrates the line of teas that Microsoft has invented to soothe harried Windows users (Refresh Raspberry being my favourite). I'm also a sucker for the adverts that have funny acts of violence in them such as the one for Sprint (I think) where the two men were comparing phone features and one of them claimed to have theft deterrent which he demonstrated by throwing the phone at the other man's head. Outpost.com had some my all time favourites in which they'd try to make an impact on viewers of the commercial by unleashing packs of wolves on high school bands and firing gerbils from a cannon.

Ok, yes, let's get it out of the way: I have a bit of a dark sense of humour. It's not like any real band kids or gerbils got hurt. And throwing a cell phone at someone's head is probably a little mean but it still made me laugh because it was so unexpected.

Anyway, so I actually pay attention to the commercials. I like them, particularly if they're entertaining. I'm a good little consumer: If the ad makes an impact, I might be inclined to consider checking out the product. After all, I love that little Cockney Geico Gekko so much, I actually switched to Geico for my car insurance needs.

And, um, actually, that's true. Mock all you like. He's cute. I even have a little statue of him on my desk. So there.

Back to the blog topic at hand. Now that the election is done (did I mention...hurrah!?), I've been paying more attention to the ads again. And, well, I've noticed a disturbing trend.

Christmas. My TV is showing me commercials for Christmas stuff.

Here's the thing: I adore Christmas. I love the snow, the holly, the decorating of the tree, the delicious baking that surrounds me, particularly my mum's sausage rolls and mince pies, the gift buying, the gift wrapping, the carols...all of it. I love the comfort of the holidays. I even love the crazy shopping, most of the time.

It's just...well...I'm not ready for it yet. I don't think we're supposed to be. It was Halloween a week ago. Thanksgiving hasn't happened yet. It's still three weeks away.

I suppose we're lucky, really. I've noticed that Wal-Mart has subtly been sneaking in Christmas stuff into their garden section since late August. Lowes too.

I know it's an attempt to get people spending money sooner. I know that stores think the earlier they start selling stuff, the more money they can make. I just don't like that.

I'm ok with Christmas hitting in full swing the day after Thanksgiving. In fact, last year, I was one of the psycho-shoppers looking for the bargains at 4 a.m. It was an experience, that's all I'll say. I just like to be prepared.

The thing is, I actually have started Christmas shopping. I try to buy gifts that I think people would like when I find them. This means I don't have a mad dash right before Christmas and also allows me to spend more wisely. But that was my trick and I liked being able to peruse stores WITHOUT the insipid "Frosty the Snowman" type songs being played on a repeatable track and without everyone crowding in in case they just happen to find that Tickle Me Elmo v.5000 that also works as a personal assistant as well as having maniacal giggling fits when you tickle it.*

I also don't like Christmas to be forced on me like this. I want it to sink in, slowly. I want the first snowfall in November to be quiet and stand on it's own merit; I don't want to have it ruined by a sudden rush of Christmas cheer. I want to be able to still have a pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks until Thanksgiving and THEN I want to have the option of a Gingerbread Latte instead. Pumpkin comes before Gingerbread and it spans two holidays- Halloween and Thanksgiving. Let me have my Dryers pumpkin ice-cream for a couple more weeks until I have to dig through the Candy Cane Crunch to see if Wal-Mart still has it.

And, Wal-Mart, DO NOT turn put your Christmas food stuff in the juice aisle. Seriously, I want to go buy my Juicy Juice without being distracted by the increasingly large array of candy-cane flavours. Seriously, candy canes=peppermint. What is up with with the cinnamon chocolate ones? I love licorice but even I would not consider eating a licorice candy cane.

Well, not until Christmas, anyway.

So, that's my rant for now. In a couple of weeks, I might be ready to hit the department stores and start shopping. This means it will be freezing cold out so that you have to wear a heavy coat and then when you get inside, you will almost die of heatstroke inside the department stores. That's a Christmas tradition in itself I think.

Some traditions I could deal with now. Like mum's baking. Particularly the sausage rolls. Those can be a year-round thing. Or even a this-weekend thing. And yes, Captain Monkeypants is nothing if not a subtle hinter.

But as for the rest of Christmas, I don't think any of us are really ready to start decking the halls, going on sleigh rides, dreaming of a white Christmas or roasting chestnuts on an open fire. We all have rotting pumpkins to clear away, Halloween candy to buy at 75% off and Thanksgiving turkey to think about first. Only when the blissful peace of a Thanksgiving Night after all the guests leave settles upon us should we turn our thoughts to Christmas.

And until then, I will try to ignore the commericals I see on my tv and avoid the juice aisle in Walmart. Maybe I'll start drinking fresh juice instead. I really like that Florida Orange juice commercial with the man on a crate talking about things that he likes....

Happy Friday. Have a great weekend!

*Note: There is no such thing as Tickle Me Elmo v.5000 to the best of my knowledge just in case you decided to go looking for it or something. I made it up. Obviously.

Carving Pumpkins...

So, I carved my annual pumpkin last night. It's a Halloween tradition for me. Growing up in the UK, Halloween wasn't much of a holiday. In fact, aside from making paper witches out of construction paper, lolly sticks and glue, we really didn't do very much. Trick or treating wasn't allowed and so, at most, there would be halloween parties in which games like bobbing for apples was the main focus. I know, in recent years, the UK has become very influenced by the U.S. in regards to Halloween and nowadays, the traditions are similar between both the U.S. and the U.K. But, back when I was a young 'un (not too many years ago), we used to emphasis the spooky rather than the sweet taste of a bucketful of candy.

I think the reason we never cared is that on November 5th, we'd have Guy Fawkes night, a deliciously pagan holiday that I'll blog about on November 5th.

But I do remember when I was really young that I believed in Halloween. I truly believed there were witches and wizards flying around at night, that the dark, chilly night was full of ghosts and demons, all celebrating the fact that this was their night, a night in which they were allowed to be scary and crawl out of the shadows. I had an overactive imagination which, naturally, led to a lot of nightmares and having my parents leave the light on while I slept. Yet it seemed right, for Halloween. It made sense. As I got older, I stopped being quite so literal but I still let myself imagine those covens of witches, celebrating their night, Macbeth style.

So, when my siblings and I moved to the U.S., our first Halloween was a bit of an awakening. It was freezing, for a start, and so even though the kids had dressed up, they had to wear big coats over their costumes which took away from the effect, somewhat. Then they'd go beg for candy. No one ever really thought about the trick part or trick or treat. I always thought that was a shame. It was such an accepted thing that people would willingly give out candy that there was no opportunity to concentrate on the darker side of the trick or treat ritual. Ok, so there were a few kids who would toilet paper (t.p. for short) people's houses but since they did that year round, it didn't mean much. I think I saw eggs on someone's car once or twice but, again, there were quite a few mean kids in the town where I grew up and so that wasn't limited to Halloween either.

Not that I'm endorsing property damage. I don't. For the record. It's just one of those things...trick OR treat. I did trick or treat exactly once in my life and had enough of those revolting peanut butter kisses and Tootsie Rolls (which, in my opinion are nothing but Imposter Chocolate and will never, ever be real chocolate and thus they are worthless) to last me a lifetime. Everyone gave out treats, there was no need to trick. It seemed odd. It still does, a little.

So, I started my own traditions now that I'm older. I never get trick or treaters because I live in flat that has a locked entrance door. So, on Halloween or a day or two prior, depending on my schedule, I carve my pumpkin.

Last night was that night. For the first time, I actually splurged and bought a carving kit. Normally it's me, some knives and spoons and my own creativity. By the time I'm normally done carving, I have a spoon that is bent at a 90 degree angle from scooping, assorted cuts where I got a bit too enthuastic in my carving that haven't quite stopped bleeding yet and a lopsided yet well-meaning pumpkin with face of some sort. This year, armed with my kit, I was ready to go.

Before I could begin, there were other things I had to do. I always make a baked sweet potato for dinner with sausages and a vegetable on carving night. Last night, it was baked asparagus with garlic and parmesan (I'm trying to be better about cooking). After I'm done eating, I pop in "Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone" and begin carving.

I had lit my pumpkin spice candle. I drink pumpkin ale. Yes, I'm a bit into this pumpkin thing. Ironically enough, I don't like pumpkin pie. I do, however, like the flavour of pumpkin pie stuff. I still have yet to get my hands on the Dreyer's Pumpkin Pie ice-cream but the Baskin Robbins stuff is fantastic. Pumpkin ale is awesome.

And I carved. I used a pattern this year. I've never really done that before. I'm not sure I'd do it again. The kit supposedly had an ingenious little tool you'd roll on top of the pattern to transfer it to the pumpkin. The tool is, literally, miniscule. It's made for really, really little people, maybe the size of a smurf. My hand cramped up. I was going to carve some howling wolves but the pattern transfer thingy didn't work and I knew it'd never turn outs. I know my limits of carving skill. So I went for this weird owl-ghoul-thingy. It came out ok. It looked like the pattern. It just...lacks personality.

I should probably tell you that normally, my pumpkins represent what I'm into at the time. For three years running, I carved pumpkins that looked like Frank the Bunny from the movie Donnie Darko. Another year, it was a pumpkin that blazed the Harry Potter logo on one side, Green Day on the other. Another year, i did an evil pirate. Another year a skull and crossbones. All done, relatively, free-hand. They might have been a bit lopsided but they meant well.

This year, my pumpkin is...boring. It was almost too easy. And when it turned out, instead of what I thought was an owl, it was some weird monster with folded arms. It looked like an owl until I put the candle in the pumpkin. I'd paste a picture but due to the fact my camera has no batteries and that my cell phone camera takes pictures the size of a postage stamp, you'll have to take my word for it.

On the plus side, I did roast the seeds. I like to catch some of the flesh between the seeds, salt that and roast it. Delicious. Along with the beer and the softly scented candle, it was still a lovely, tranquil evening.

I just wish my pumpkin was less...generic. I'm debating doing another one. After all, it's Halloween tomorrow and there's still some time.

But this time, I'm not using a pattern. There's a lot to be said for the enthuiasm of creativity, even if it doesn't turn out perfectly. Using a pattern is simple but it's much for fun to go outside the lines and start carving away. Maybe I'll stick to using the tools that came with the kit though. There's a lot less blood that way.