User Name
Password
AppleNova Forums » AppleOutsider »

Halloween 2023...anyone? Bueller?


Register Members List Calendar Search FAQ Posting Guidelines
Halloween 2023...anyone? Bueller?
Thread Tools
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-10-31, 20:43

Man, this seems to be one of those holidays fast fading into "remember when...?" territory.

Got one - ONE - trick-or-treater tonight, a little boy who moved in to the house next door with his mom and dad last fall. He was dressed as a cow, and his dad was pulling him in around in a wagon. The kid barely acted like he wanted to be there, until I dropped three Kit-Kats into his bucket.

It is a bit chilly/windy here, so maybe that kept some of the kids away, but everyone I've talked to this evening has reported the same thing...

I think a lot of bratty, entitled kids get candy (and anything else they want) 24/7/365, so holidays like this, where you have to get out and freeze your ass off and walk for your candy, just holds zero appeal to your average 2023 10-year-old.

"Mom keeps a bag of little mini Butterfingers in the pantry...why do I need to get out and walk around for any?"

All I know is that when we were kids, back in the 70's, my sister and I didn't get candy on the regular. This - this - holiday meant everything, as it was our once-a-year approved haul. And we'd go out for hours, using pillowcases. and we'd still be nibbling on halloween candy until April, because this was really our one night a year that we got to get as much as we could.

We'd walk our ass off, to neighbors blocks away that we didn't even know, and just canvas them completely. Anyone's whose porch lights were on were still fair game. It was always my favorite holiday in my yoof, but I just don't think modern kids see the point much anymore. "I've got a Costco crate of Kit-Kats in the garage...".

It's just no longer special to many, as they can have candy any day, any time they want. The main allure/appeal of the holiday just isn't like it once was. I figure, in my lifetime, the practice will stop entirely.

I think a lot of parents have turned to organized church/mall/store outings, where they can walk their kids through a brightly lit Walmart and have dressed-up employees hand out candy, or organized, "safe" church-based things with people you know. It's kinda scary, if you strip it all down...the one night a year your parents are totally cool with you going up to stranger's houses and accepting whatever they toss into your bag/bucket to eat. Nobody would do that the other 364 days of the year. "Paul, get out of that man's yard, now! And don't you EVER accept candy from him!!!"



Weird-ass holiday, one where (some) women take the opportunity to live out any sort of "dirty girl" fantasies they may be harboring the other 11 months (BlowJob Princess Leia or DP Wonder Woman, etc.), with plenty of cleavage, leg, fishnets, garters, etc. And where their boyfriends/hubbies can dress up as "official government titty inspectors" or whatever, and, for one night, nobody gets mad, sued or slapped. It's morphed into way more of an adult-oriented thing, I think. I got dragged to a party about 9-10 years ago and I was just kinda standing there thinking "how is this any different from a low-rent titty bar? I don't wanna see any of these shot-out wrecks naked either", "And when, exactly, does the full-on swinging/swapping portion of the evening commence?" I left before I had my answer, it was just tacky and gross to me. I'm no prude, but even I've got a few standards and things I want no part of. Overweight housewives, painted up like Dodge City saloon whores, with unfortunate tattoos and dirty feet, top that list.

Halloween is not the holiday I used to look so forward to, and loved/enjoyed over all the others!

In my teens and parts of my 20's, I was playing music pretty steadily and almost always had a big party gig on Halloween, for years. At someone's house, mostly with people I kinda knew, everyone behaved, etc. It was fun, people just danced and socialized, minus the PornHub.com angle/vibe. I miss those Halloweens most of all, bashing out the Stones or Mellencamp's latest, and people dancing on couches, coffee tables, etc. And the cops NOT showing up.

Last edited by psmith2.0 : 2023-10-31 at 20:58.
  quote
PB PM
Sneaky Punk
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
Send a message via Skype™ to PB PM 
2023-10-31, 20:46

The cost of the candy is crazy now, unless you buy it on Halloween day, or after. They were asking $26 for one of the boxes of the tiny candies. No wonder nobody wants to do it.

Still we typically get 70-100 most years, so it must be an area thing.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-10-31, 21:00

Maybe.

Best to go to Dollar Tree (now $1.25 Tree, basically) and buying those big assorted bags...Smarties, Payday, Ring Pops and whatever else.

But, yeah. Bought at regular stores, candy is about like gasoline (or Apple RAM).

I think my location (across a busy road from a hopping subdivision, with a long, sloped driveway, kinda far apart from surrounding houses, just doesn't look appealing? The subdivision across the road was full-tilt packed, little silhouetted groups of kids moving in clusters from house to house. I sat on my porch earlier and watched for a bit. If I lived over there, I would've been answering the door about 40-50 times, since 6pm.
  quote
PB PM
Sneaky Punk
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
Send a message via Skype™ to PB PM 
2023-10-31, 21:14

Quote:
Originally Posted by psmith2.0 View Post
Maybe.

Best to go to Dollar Tree (now $1.25 Tree, basically) and buying those big assorted bags...Smarties, Payday, Ring Pops and whatever else.
Yeah, you Americans get everything super cheap. Thus is the way of the world. The packs I talked about were on for $10 at Wallmart, but I don't shop at big American retailers if I don't have to (I didn't pay $26 a box either FYI).
  quote
turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2023-11-01, 08:14

Where I live there is a lot of road between houses. There are some subdivisions not far from us, but it just isn't worth the effort to try to go door to door. So around here it is common to have "Trunk or Treat" events. Basically a bunch of people dress up the back of they car in a parking lot and hand out candy to the kids that pass through in lines. Some have mini-games, others just cool displays.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
  quote
709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2023-11-01, 09:57

We got absolutely dumped on* late yesterday afternoon and the temps plummeted, so I didn't expect many, if any. We haven't got a lot of T-or-T-aged kids in this neighborhood nowadays, and the numbers have been dwindling the last few years, so last minute I decided to turn the porch light off and head out for a walk and grab a burger. Returned after dark and not many of the neighbors had their porch lights on either, so we probably got passed over as a block. It was so wet and cold that parents were pretty much driving kids door-to-door . Ugh.


*edit: This was all in a couple of hours... quite the change from last week. Even woke up to no power this morning!


So it goes.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-01, 11:23

Yeah, we’ve dropped 30 degrees here locally in 24 hours, our first overnight freezing temps of the year, last night and tonight. That surely kept a lot of folks at home. Not much fun walking in the dark, when it’s cold.

Especially this softer bunch, who’d probably rather stay home and play one of those candy games on their iPhones anyway. Rack up imaginary, digital candy than the real thing.

If I had the ability to do so in 1976, would I? Hard to say. The whole vibe was different then. The idea of putting on a costume and canvassing neighborhoods with your buddies was a good, fun thing. The “couch potato” thing hadn’t fully arrived/set in during that period (no cable TV, VCRs, movie rentals or Internet). We already walked/ride bikes all over the place, daily. To do so for free candy? Hellooooo!!

Kinda sad, seeing that all fade away and knowing it’ll end completely in my lifetime.
  quote
Matsu
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
 
2023-11-01, 12:39

I took the kids out last night: Ghost town compared to last year, where there was a lot of pent up post-COVID FOMO I guess. The quality of Halloween treats has certainly improved from my day. I've been rummaging through packets of chips and Reese Peanut Butter Cups all morning. Tasty. If I eat any more I'll have to tell the kiddos that they failed the "safety" inspection.

40 years ago, when you mostly expected squishy caramel cubes and sugar candies, pint sized candy bars and single serving potato chips were like striking gold.

.........................................
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-01, 12:45

I loved getting the little mini-size Mounds bars. Always my favorite. Everything else was just gravy.

We'd all go out and make our run/haul, come back to my grandparents' house and dump our full pillow cases into their living room floor and then gather around and spend the next hour or so trading/making deals. Getting rid of stuff I didn't like to my sister, who did, and then getting something back in return.

I think back to some of those mid-70's era candy...most are long gone. But I always like Smarties or anything lemon or orange flavored. Not a huge chocolate guy, so any Hershey's bar (solid chocolate, through and through) was always up for grabs to anyone wanting to get rid of their Mounds or Junior Mints. I like a thin layer of chocolate over coconut, mint, caramel or peanut butter, but never solid. Ugh.

I remember this thing called a Marathon bar, it was braided chocolate over caramel and, in its package, was about a foot long? And because of the chewiness of the caramel, it took forever (a marathon) to eat it all. I can see the actual candy, the packaging, logo, etc. in my head, clear as day. But I think they must've stopped making them, as I've not seen one in 35+ years. But I loved them as a pup.

Now I'm hungry. I bet Walgreen's has Halloween candy for 80% off today. They always have HUGE sales, the day after Halloween and Christmas, of their season snacks/candy. I should go on a Mounds run.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-01, 13:02

I've written about this before, but, thankfully, didn't encounter it last night.

In years past, after the initial main rush of actual little kids in costume, around 9pm or later, the people ringing the door bell would slowly morph into the surly teen crowd, all a foot taller than me. Huge walls of human beings, just kinda glaring. No conversation, far older than anyone you'd expect, no costume, etc.

What can you do? In my younger, feistier days I'd be like "where's the effort? Beat it..." and close the door.

Now, I don't wanna wake up to dogshit on my porch, my side mirrors ripped off my car, eggs all over the house, etc., so I just gave in and doled out the bare amount possible just to protect my property? I don't wanna wake up, making calls to my insurance company, first thing.

That used to just shred my ass, seeing that. It was like mafia extortion. A couple of hulking goons showing up and you knew if you didn't give them some candy, there would be trouble. I don't want trouble, so it was just easily to toss them a Kit-Kat, while asking if their costumes got lost/confiscated at the juvenile detention center.

My rule now, last night, was porch light/foyer light off at 9pm, making the area outside dark as could be an unappealing to walk toward. I'm sorry, but I'm not nuts about opening the door at 10:30pm to a N.W.A. tribute band.

I don't have an age limit or cutoff. Anyone showing up in a cool costume, homemade/DIY or store-bought, gets candy. Extra points if you say "thanks", but I'm not expecting miracles at this point.
  quote
turtle
Lord of the Rant.
Formerly turtle2472
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Upstate South Carolina
 
2023-11-01, 14:10

That was a concern back in Va Beach for me. Now it would be more like random kids going to our home in the sticks... not likely. I mean, they could but they would get greater joy screwing with a bunch of houses rather than have to drive from one house to the next.

Louis L'Amour, “To make democracy work, we must be a nation of participants, not simply observers. One who does not vote has no right to complain.”
Visit our archived Minecraft world! | Maybe someday I'll proof read, until then deal with it.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-01, 14:57

The store bought costumes have gotten pretty cool. The superheroes all have muscle-padding and accurate design/coloring. If you’re a kid into Marvel or Star Wars, you have some real cool stuff to choose from!

Compared to those little uo-in-flames vinyl/plastic one-siza-fits-none little things back in the day. I was Ecek Knievel when I was 4 or 5. It was the little white suit - it just smelled like it was going to go up in flames at any second - and Tge littke face mask with the elastic band. I’ve tried to find pics of it. I know o have some.

It didn’t come with the wife-beating cane, however. The action figure did. Hey, it was different times.
  quote
PB PM
Sneaky Punk
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
Send a message via Skype™ to PB PM 
2023-11-01, 15:17

Last night 59 visitors. The highlight of the night there is the endless fireworks and firecrackers. From 5PM till, well when the kids go to school the next day. It sounds like a war zone here every Halloween. So annoying.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-01, 16:59

I have neighbors who, every July 4th (and a few other holidays) must spend 3-4 paychecks on fireworks. They start around 10am on this side street between my place and theirs and they go until well after 10pm, usually with their friends coming over and making a big party of it. Every damn near. I get now where, come midnight, I call the cops.

"Hey, I've been cool for 12+ hours, having my windows rattled - and my cat on edge - nonstop. It's now 12:10am. I don't give a shit what they bought or what they have "rights" to. I have a "right" to not be a nervous wreck with all the loud-ass bangs/pops nonstop. I didn't call at 10 or 11pm. But midnight is late enough. Send a car out to shut it down, or I'm gonna go over there and then you'll have to send more cops than you'd like. Your choice."

I told that to the smart-ass dispatcher this summer who tried to argue with me, or "talk me down", giving me a history lesson on the holiday and why people buy/use fireworks. Uh...I don't care. I know all the above. Use them. It's not the fireworks, it's the "it's after midnight, assholes" aspect of it. I need to go to sleep, and they're making it where I can't. No more complicated than that.

I told him that, and also that I hoped he was recording the call. I was getting some good shots in.

Within minutes, a cruiser comes through and they finally realize "oh, it's late..." and stop.

How much of an ill-mannered oblivitard do you have to be? Midnight on a weeknight and you're out there setting off what sounds like dynamite. I don't mind the sparkly, colorful stuff that just "sizzles" or or whatever. But when it sounds like they're trying to open a copper mine next door and blasting through the bedrock, it gets old PDQ.

It's a shame I have to call the cops. I'm not wanting anyone to get in trouble (they never do, which is why it happens every year), but it's a bunch of 20/30-something guys over there, with their wives and girlfriends hanging around. Beers all over the place, caps on backwards (you know, the uniform). I've been on the planet long enough to know, no matter how I go over there or approach them or how nicely/reasonably I ask, drunk bro-dudes with their "bitches" nearby always have to bow-up and do the tough-guy "Tap-Out" shtick. He'll tell me to go fuck myself and then I'll beat him with a metal garbage can lid and then the cops are gonna show up anyway. I'd rather just let someone with a badge and gun handle it. They get paid to, and most hat-on-backwards bro-dudes, no matter how drunk, aren't gonna mouth off/step to a cop like they would me, so...

Come midnight, I want to be horizontal and sawing logs. I can't when there are LOUD explosions every 40 seconds.
  quote
PB PM
Sneaky Punk
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Vancouver, BC
Send a message via Skype™ to PB PM 
2023-11-01, 17:09

I don't mind a few fireworks, when people do it right and at reasonable times. It's not that, it's teens/20 somethings roaming around the streets endless throwing firecrackers everywhere, but it's just a thing here. From the end of September until a week or so after Halloween every weekend they are at it. Then Halloween in the big push. Been that way since I was born. On the weekend there was so much around that there was ash on my truck, and a spent one found under it. Dang. Hello there is a gas tank there! Would be so pissed if my 1 year old truck got destroyed by a $5 firecracker from some moronic kid looking to get jollies on Saturday night.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-01, 20:50

Yeah, that’s no good. I just don’t like loud, obnoxious noise after 9-10pm. But, yes…the fire/explosion danger doesn’t help. I hate the sound of firecrackers, that loud pop. Drives me batty.

Thankfully I only hear them 2-3 times a year.
  quote
709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2023-11-02, 09:02

Quote:
Originally Posted by psmith2.0 View Post
I remember this thing called a Marathon bar, it was braided chocolate over caramel and, in its package, was about a foot long? And because of the chewiness of the caramel, it took forever (a marathon) to eat it all. I can see the actual candy, the packaging, logo, etc. in my head, clear as day. But I think they must've stopped making them, as I've not seen one in 35+ years. But I loved them as a pup.
I used to put them in the freezer to easily break off chunks. The best! Marathons, Chunky bars, and Bub's Daddy bubblegum (those foot-long sticks of pure chewing sugar) were my favorites back in the day. Bub's Daddy is long gone, and I haven't seen a Chunky in years.

I recently found myself wandering around in a very Dutch grocery store, and besides the walls of black licorice variations they had 5-sticks of chewing gum packages in that old clove flavor, licorice BlackJack, TeaBerry, Beemans, etc. Hadn't seen those in decades.

Quote:
Originally Posted by psmith2.0 View Post
- and Tge littke face mask with the elastic band. I’ve tried to find pics of it. I know o have some.
I can still feel the razor sharp edges of the eyes & lips holes.

So it goes.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-02, 09:31

Definitely. Those things were crazy. Then again, we all rode around on our bikes and skateboards, with not a helmet around for miles. A different time. Safety/comfort for kids wasn’t really the focus.

“Here, go play with these lawn darts. If you don’t impale your skull, come back when it gets dark so we can get your flammable PJs on you!”

Those little boxed character costumes were insane. “So if I don’t go up in flames from the little one-piece jumpsuit, the mask can cut my face to shreds? Awesome, can’t wait!”

Everything in the 70’s was flammable, sharp, hard, abrasive. I remember at my K-3 school, the playground was on asphalt (nice) and the jungle gym was a metal, pipes-screwed-together thing, a good 10-12 feet high. Exposed bolts, not a soft, rounded rubberized component anywhere. Everything out there was metal. Burn yourself in warmer months, frostbite/freeze in the winter. No padding, mats, soft surfaces. We had recess injuries every day. You just always hoped it wasn’t your friend or anyone you knew/liked.

A fall, a scrape/snag, a head bonk. Thankfully this was before everyone learned the joy of lawsuits and suing over everything, so a little Band-Aid and some spray stuff and life went on. Nobody got airlifted to the ER, parents didn’t show up screaming, crying, lawyers in tow, threatening to sue everyone/everything in sight, we didn’t light candles or put teddy bears on the playground for our fallen, absent comrades, etc.

We moved across the state line to Georgia in the summer between my 3rd and 4th grade. When I started 4th grade in the fall at my new school, there was a damn slide on the playground, all metal of course, that felt/looked as high as the Eiffel Tower. I’m sure it was only 15-20 feet, but when you’re only 4-feet, it doesn’t take much. We’d all line up to climb it and slide down, right into sharp gravel. I guess the school board voted down the lava pit. “Too expensive!”

School playgrounds are now built from cotton candy and unicorn farts, and name calling is the most serious, devastating injury you can expect.

Last edited by psmith2.0 : 2023-11-02 at 09:55.
  quote
tomoe
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Nov 2006
 
2023-11-02, 21:26

I liked Halloween this year for the first time in well over a decade. Though for us it was a little different. We moved to a new neighborhood that has a Halloween block party. About four blocks total and lots of cool house installations — little mini haunted houses, highschool band doing brass & percussion renditions of Thriller. Kiddos and parents all dressed up. Had an awesome costume for our 4.5 month old and took her out as well — she was all amused looking around.
  quote
psmith2.0
Mr. Vieira
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Tennessee
 
2023-11-02, 23:14

Ooh, tgat does sound fun. I’d love such a thing here. I’d go!

25-30 years ago, I went to such a thing in Cleveland, TN, a small old town about 30 miles/minutes north of here. It was several blocks of the “old town” part, with the courthouse/town square (big gazebo), old houses all decorated up, everyone in costumes, Apple bobbing and and the whole bit. Downtown, on a flatbed truck, old 50’s band The Coasters (“Charlie Brown”, “Yakety Yak”, etc….Google/YouTube ‘em) played, and sounded good! One of those older, vocal/harmony/doo-wop-oriented bands where all the original members were probably long dead or retired, because these were all younger, 30/40-something guys with Jheri curl hair/1990’s style/cuts and so forth, but they were covering/nailing all the hits and nobody seemed to notice/mind that they weren’t 90-year-old guys who were on the original records. It was 4-5 singers, with some choreography, and a small band backing them. It was so cold that night. There were fire barrels placed throughout and I kept finding one to warn myself with.

Last edited by psmith2.0 : 2023-11-02 at 23:29.
  quote
Posting Rules Navigation
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Post Reply

Forum Jump
Thread Tools
Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
M3, M3 Pro, M3 Max 2023 MacBook Pro chucker Apple Products 66 2023-11-25 23:37
2023 M3 iMac chucker Apple Products 2 2023-10-30 23:52
The CES 2023 Thread Frank777 Speculation and Rumors 49 2023-08-22 10:20
Wwdc 2023 709 Speculation and Rumors 35 2023-06-09 14:39
Ferris Bueller's Day Off soundtrack intlplby AppleOutsider 5 2007-01-28 16:46


« Previous Thread | Next Thread »

All times are GMT -5. The time now is 15:05.


Powered by vBulletin®
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©2004 - 2024, AppleNova