Halloween, full moon, Daylight Saving Time ends...it’s all happening this weekend. Toss in yet another hurricane headed our way at this writing and it looks like the horror flick dubbed The Year 2020 is just getting started. Oh, and there is that presidential election on Tuesday and the COVID-19 which seems to get worse by the day.
If it were not for the pandemic, and the hurricane, this might have been the perfect year for a big Halloween costume party, or a big ole bonfire out in a pasture somewhere, or perhaps a jaunt to New Orleans for a real haunted tour. That last one is a little bit spooky to think about, especially this year!
Unfortunately, none of this will materialize for the majority of us. As has been the case most of the year, we’ll be sitting at home on another Saturday night wondering if we’ll be able to stay up late enough to see what the next Saturday Night Live spoof of the campaign between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden is all about. I probably won’t make it through that either.
COVID-19 makes me tired. Tired of doing nothing and tired of working hard on all sorts of different projects around the house to kill time. Staying up after 10 o’clock even on a Saturday night is simply no longer a part of my regular routine. It’s even worse than that on week nights. I’m ashamed to mention my bedtime on those days.
Since most folks are “discouraging” door to door trick-o-treating I wonder if there will be a super-duper candy sale next week. We hardly ever have kids come knocking on our door any more. In recent years there have been organized events that make for a safer environment for the kiddos. Most of those have been cancelled this year or scaled back to an extent, so I’m wondering again should we buy candy just in case somebody comes knocking or just turn out the lights, blow out the Jack-o-lantern, and pretend we’re not at home.
That’s not much fun.
Years ago I prided myself in having the shock and awe factor at our front door, spooking the young and old alike. Sometimes we’d even have folks coming back again and again, not for the candy, but for the thrill. And, for the thrill of watching some of the other youngsters they had sent to our house take off like a bolt of greased lightening when I answered the door.
I expect we will buy some treats. Something that we like with chocolate and nuts and caramel. That way the leftovers can be dessert before bedtime if we can keep our eyes open.
I do plan on pulling out my Night of the Living Dead movie and popping that into the player for an hour or so of fun and excitement in a wonderful, pitiful, silly, stupid, display of some of the most horrific acting ever know to man, or beast. It is my favorite, in spite of the corny nature, and has been since childhood when it premiered on the big screen at the old Roxy Theatre in Newton.
It wouldn’t be Halloween without it and at least that will be some simulance of normalcy.
I suppose we’re all pretty much to the point that we no longer remember what normal is, or was before March and the onset of the pandemic, and we don’t really know what is to come in the foreseeable future.
One thing for certain, the election is on Tuesday, and although we likely will not know the results that same day, it may be more trick than treat for the next four years than any of us care to think about.
Now, that’s spooky!
So, please, if you haven’t already, do go vote, and, have a safe and happy Halloween.
