Tagged: halloween

The Black Menu at New World Bistro Bar

Reservations for 7, we walked to New World Bistro Bar. Streets were lit up with orange lights, flashing greens, eerie purples. Little armies of costumed children and their parents marched without plan.

The Black Menu had a lot of good looking stuff on it. Both of the soups sounded good; I tried the butternut squash. All of the drinks were interesting; we had both the Witch’s Brew and the Black Bubbles. I preferred the sparking shiraz.

For dinner I had a blackened strip steak. It was served with greens, black beans, and mashed sweet potatoes. The steak was probably twice as big as it needed to be, but I don’t get to eat steak very often so it was a rare treat. It had a nice edge of fat and some delicious marbling.

There were more trick or treaters out on the way home. Someone on Delaware had built a haunted house in their front yard; they had a sign that read No Costume No Candy and they wished us a Happy Halloween.

A Halloween Costume Retrospective

Childhood:
Donatello from the TMNT
A knight with horse
A bare-chested Indian
A mummy

I’m sure that throughout high school and college I went as a vampire, or something similar, repeatedly. I remember going through several pairs of those fangs that require you to melt plastic and mold it to your teeth. The only costume I can remember distinctly is a skeleton, because I remember putting on the makeup in front of a big mirror with a friend of mine.

Post-college:
A phantasm (leather mask, Blackout @ The Power Company)
One year we went to NYC for the Halloween Parade. I don’t remember what I wore, but I remember someone in our group had ridiculous shoes that were impossible to walk in.
An orc (Honorable Mention)
Hooded fiend (At somebody’s basement party)
A satyr (although people thought I was The Devil)

More recently:
Steampunk gunslinger (2006)
Venetian pirate (2007)
Ghoulish coachman (2008)
Shoggoth (2009)
Nightwelder (2010)

I have no idea what I’m going to do this year. And I have less than a week to figure it out.

The Ninth Pumpkin Happening

Mike and Amanda arrived a little after two. We had some munchies and caught up, and then headed out to Indian Ladder Farms. The PYO patch looked pretty good. Lots of bright orange. Once we’d selected our pumpkins, we walked up to get cider donuts. The line wasn’t long but they only had one window open, so it was slow. Half an hour later we sat down at a picnic table in the herb garden to eat our delicious treats. We were walking up to see the animals when Kathleen said something about the Scottish Highland cow not being there anymore. It made me sad to think about it. Home again, we had some delicious chili and cornbread, and hot mulled cider with applejack. We cued up a hilariously bad movie about two giant monsters fighting it out, and set about carving our pumpkins. Later, we put them on the porch and lit them up. It was a pretty good time.

Some Thoughts on Halloween

It is October and I would be remiss if I did not write something about Halloween. I used to be really into Halloween, but the older I’ve gotten, the more distanced I am. Perhaps I have unreasonable expectations, but I was never able to get into the way other people celebrated Halloween. Store bought costumes are disgusting. No one has any imagination anymore.

One year I threw a huge party at the house I was renting. We had thirty people there, in costume. Everyone entered the house through the haunted house I built in the basement. There was a scavenger hunt.

One year I spent Halloween hunched over in someone’s basement, trying not to scrape the top of my head against the rusty nails and broken lightbulbs hanging from the ceiling, unable to make myself drink what they were calling beer and gin, while someone’s shitty band made it impossible to hear yourself think.

Every year Kathleen and I throw a Pumpkin Party. We go out to Indian Ladder Farms, pick pumpkins, look at the animals, and eat cider donuts and hot apple cider. Then we go home and carve the pumpkins, eat things Kathleen has baked, and drink concoctions I have … concocted. It’s usually a good time. Once we went in the rain. Once we played zombie games. We used to watch scary movies until it became impossible to pick anything that wasn’t cheesy or mind-jarringly frightening. Once everyone has carved their pumpkins up, we put them in a dark place and light them up with candles, and try to photograph them.

I’ll be honest though. The most we’ve ever had is five people, ourselves included. I’m not sure if you can really consider that a party, and I’m pretty sure the word “party” is what bugs me about the whole thing. If it wasn’t a party, if it was a get together or a shindig or a happening (yes that word has some p’s in it, that’ll do) it would be easier for me to be okay with it.

This year is our Ninth Annual Pumpkin Happening; it’ll be on Saturday, October 22nd.