Happy Halloween!

It's once more that most ghoulish day of the year!

No, not election day or tax day, my pretties! It's Halloween!

In the spirit (gasp!) of the moment, here are a few images from trick-or-treat night last Saturday (when folks 'round here celebrate Halloween, I guess to get it out of the way so they can start decorating for Thanksgiving).

The kids and I went to the elementary school Halloween party, then into town for trick-or-treating. It's pretty cool and nostalgic to take my kids to many of the same houses I rang the doorbells on nearly four (!) decades ago.

Many things are exactly the same now as they were back in the early 1970s on the streets of Marietta on Halloween night. The excited shouts of packs of kids trying to find the most lucrative candy stops. The crunching of fall leaves underfoot. The dog crap that someone inevitably steps in and tracks up the front steps. The smell of cigarettes from parents smoking beyond the pool of porchlight, watching their kids rake in the sweets.

(If THAT house gave you a Snickers Brittany-Jo, your mamaw's gonna need a bite! And that ain't optional!")

But then some things are different today...

The candy is better and seemingly more abundant. The costumes are better, too, but fewer of them are home-made these days. A few other differences I noticed: when I was a trick-or-treater there was always a foot of snow on the ground and there were wolves and Indians chasing us. Plus all I had for a costume was an old feed sack. Kids today don't know how easy they've got it!

Here's some eye candy of my OWN candy grubbers.

Liam at the school party as Batman in his store-boughten costume. For more on the costume decisions, see Zick's blog.

Phoebe as a blue-haired goth harpy. Liam as grave desecrator.

Campesino Man.

Julie's costume this year was ossum!