Seriously? Halloween on a Saturday? Combined With Daylight Saving Time? Who Let This Happen?

I never galvanized the adults in my community to form PAH! (Parents Against Halloween!) and now we're all paying for it, stuck at home on a perfect fall Saturday, beholden to the masses of grotesquely costumed children, serving them candy and treats-- like they don't get enough of those?-- while our own children rake in bags of processed sugar, which I don't have the fortitude to resist, so I'll spend the next month in the throes of diabetic shock, and if I do leave the house today, I'll have to drive very very carefully to avoid all the little trick-or-treating buggers--who will be all hopped up on sugar-- when they inevitably dart out in front of my car and the dog will be barking away all afternoon, because he thinks our home is being invaded by masked gremlins . . . and no one has officially told me when custom dictates that you should man the door when Halloween falls on a Saturday (in the same vein as how no one has officially told me why we participate in Daylight Saving Time) so maybe I'll just leave an empty bowl on my front porch with a post-it attached that says "Please Take One Item."

Sitcoms of Dave

I know we're a bit behind the times in my family (my Shakespeare students were astounded that I didn't know that Anne Hathaway is also a famous modern actress, and not solely Shakespeare's wife) but we finally finished watching Parks and Rec and we're quite broken up that it's over-- there hasn't been a sitcom gang that endearing since Cheers (maybe the the study group from Community) but I am pleased that my son Alex has decided on this year's Halloween costume, and it's as meta as it gets; he's going to wear a fake mustache and a purple suit jacket and carry around his saxophone and do his best to impersonate Ron Swanson's alter ego Duke Silver.

Evil Circus!

Slouching Beast presents "Evil Circus," complete with its own live-action music video; I guarantee it's some of the most evil evil-circus music ever recorded . . . but I'm not quite as keen on the video, which might be more aptly named "How to Make a Three Minute Music Video with Thirty Seconds of Film" but despite the lack of material, I think I got the most out of my son Alex's creepy Halloween mask (and the clown's weapon is a rock-pick, in case you were wondering).

Trick and Treat

Despite being exhausted from non-stop soccer events, I decided to so something fun and ambitious at my son Ian's Thursday night soccer practice: Soccer Olympics! with prizes for the winning team! . . . I figured it was the day before Halloween and the kids would enjoy some friendly competition-- and I had a funny joke planned; I was going to award the winning team oranges and then give the losing team candy, though my wife said this was a bad idea and the kids wouldn't get the joke and might kill each other and/or me-- but she was wrong, the kids tried to kill before the prizes were awarded-- the friendly competition wasn't so friendly: there was an actual fight, kids were cheating, bickering, etc. and my son got busted for an f-word violation, and so it turns out you shouldn't have Soccer Olympics the day before Halloween, but once we sorted out the mayhem and announced a winner, I forged ahead with my joke and said, "Okay, for the winners, who did so well at all the events and are such great athletes, we have something healthy and delicious: oranges!" and the kids were happy to have them-- for a moment-- but then when I said, "Okay, and we should punish the losing team and give them something bad for them . . . candy!" and then there was a fun moment of cheering and complaining, from the losers and winners, respectively, but there was no outright fighting, and then I gave the winners candy and the losers the rest of the oranges and everyone was happy.

Ironic Kid Holiday Collision

My son Alex lost his tooth at school on Halloween, but the Tooth Fairy must have been working overtime because she forgot to take it and leave some cash (and you can see why Halloween would be an extremely busy time for the Tooth Fairy, because of all the Tootsie Roll consumption . . . also, The Tooth Fairy and her spouse stayed up late binge-watching The Walking Dead, which was totally in the spirit of one kid holiday, but made it difficult to remember TWO kid holidays in one day; as an unrelated addendum, I would like to add that I would be way more careful than the people on The Walking Dead . . . they're constantly splitting up, investigating insignificant tight spaces, and holing up in spots with no good exit . . . if there's a zombie apocalypse, stick with me).

Best Halloween Treat Ever

My dog Sirius provided me with a delectable Halloween treat-- two engorged ticks-- each the size, color and consistency of a plump blueberry (I had to pry them from his stumpy tail with a forked stick . . . yuck).

A Suggestion So Rational It's Spooky

While I can't figure out exactly where America's stands in the World Obesity Rankings, it's certainly near the top, and so I have simple suggestion that will change the cultural zeitgeist and propel us down the path of national leanness and meanness: on Halloween, kids should have to earn their candy, instead of saying "trick or treat," they should be required to do ten push-ups or a few squat thrusts, or perhaps something more athletic -- like a baby freeze; I'm not sure how to initiate this new Halloween requirement, but I think an added benefit will be that Mischief Night will return with a vengeance (as lately, I haven't seen much mischief at all on Mischief Night . . . I'm going to try to get my boys to bring it back).

Nerding It Up, Tolkien Style

My son Alex, who is in 4th grade, recently finished reading The Hobbit, and he's now deep into the first book of Lord of the Rings trilogy -- and while I must admit this is some impressive and precocious reading, the fact that he's also going to be Legolas for Halloween gives me some cause for concern . . . thank God he's athletic.

Blonde People Got No Reason To . . .

My son Alex -- who does not really look like my son, as he has a beautiful head of blonde hair -- noticed that all the protagonists of his favorite books and movies are NOT blonde: Harry Potter, Batman, Dr. Who, just about every anime character in existence, etc. and this led to him complaining about his lack of choice for Halloween (why he's thinking about Halloween in Februruary is beyond me) but he is right, his only options from his pantheon is Draco Malfoy or Luke Skywalker, neither of whom appeals to him.

The Sandy Seven

The "freshman fifteen" has been debunked, but I can attest that the "Sandy Seven" is real . . . I'm wearing it around my middle -- I attribute the weight gain to the concurrence of several unavoidable events 1) I had to finish all the food in my refrigerator before it spoiled 2) living in darkness results in alcohol abuse, laziness, and over-sleeping 3) once a few people in town got power back, it caused a chain reaction of dinner invitations, and so, as a direct consequence, more gluttony and alcohol abuse 4) once we got our power back, it was reason for celebration, which, of course, involved over-indulging in every way possible 5) the post-traumatic wind-down from the stress of Hurricane Sandy involved even more drinking and bingeing on Halloween candy (and if you could pro-rate Sandy's weight gain over an entire year, you'd be talking about the Freshman 180).

PAH!

As of now, I am still the sole member of PAH! (Parents Against Halloween!) but please take a moment and reflect: are we really going to do this again? the sugar meltdowns? the costumes? the aimless wandering around the neighborhood? the eating of all the extra candy? the diabetic comas? . . . and I'm willing to negotiate with the children . . . I'm willing to offer them firecrackers and BB guns and an go-carts, if they are willing forego this "holiday" . . . I'll even buy them a couple of candy bars-- but let's put our collective feet down -- they're only children and we can stand up to them and give All Hallow's Eve back to the witches and satanists . . . I'll even carve a jack'o'lantern . . . but I just don't want to deal with that giant bowl of processed sugar . . . I can't handle it and neither can they. I'll even give them 100 bucks!

Winter is NOT Coming

It hasn't snowed around here since Halloween.

In Retrospect, This Will Be The Moment When We Lost Control of Them

My son Alex was eating at his usual lethargic pace-- everyone was long finished with dinner and he had barely started-- so I said to his younger brother Ian, "Let's go see if we can stream The Life of Mammals on Netflix," which I hoped would motivate Alex to finish his dinner, but instead he went into hysterics and Ian, feeling bad for his brother, whispered to him that he was going to stall the video by going to the bathroom for a really long time (Catherine overheard this plan and told me and we thought it was cute that he was actually doing something to help his older brother) but after Ian got out of the bathroom Alex still wasn't done with dinner and Ian was ready to watch the video but he couldn't find the piece of Halloween candy that he had selected so he coerced me into helping him look for it and I couldn't find it either, which was ridiculous, because he was just holding it and I said to him "You're driving me crazy! Where did you put it?" and finally he found it under a pillow on our little saddle stool-- which is a really weird place to leave your candy-- and it wasn't until later (with help from my wife) that I realized that this ruse, the candy-losing ruse, was also part of his stalling plan, but Ian was such a good actor that I didn't realize that I was actually falling for his plan . . . and the next morning when I asked him about it, he confessed that it was all a ruse (although he did not use the word ruse) and I am sure that when we look back, this will be the moment that we lost control.

Alex: 1 Dad: 0

While I was in the midst of one of my typical anti-Halloween diatribes, my wife sided with the boys and reminded me that I liked trick-or-treating for candy when I was a kid, and then Alex chimed in-- rather sagaciously for a six year old-- and told me something that I often forget:  "You weren't born a grown-up, Dad."

PAH!!!!!!

It is odd that adults don't get together and ban Halloween-- I can't even begin to imagine a more annoying holiday and it all hinges on the complicity of adults: if we didn't buy the candy, create the costumes, and man our houses with free sugary treats, then we wouldn't have to put up with the melt-downs, the pedophiles, the razor blades, the sugar high, the weight gain (because who actually eats all that candy?) and the inconvenience . . . and really, isn't Christmas enough . . . and so I am starting a new organization, named PAH!!!! (Parents Against Halloween).

Scary and Thrifty

Yesterday, Alex told me that he's practicing scary faces so that next Halloween he won't need to wear a mask.