Happy Halloween

My neighborhood goes kind of whacko for Halloween.* I think this may be a nationwide trend (yes?), but I must admit it is a trend that I haven't fully latched onto.

With apologies to Halloweenlover, I confess that Halloween is probably my least favorite holiday. For a non-crafty, un-creative, too practical for her own good person, Halloween doesn't offer much in the way of holiday cheer. No easy get-togethers full of good will. Instead, intense, pressure filled parties where costumes are not only expected, but judged. OY!

But it is a little difficult to be the Halloween equivalent of Scrooge (what is that, anyway? Casper the Friendly Ghost? Pollyanna? I'm just not sure) when all of your neighbors go so over the top.

Lance insists that part of the reason our neighborhood gets so decked out is that many of our neighbors are "in the industry". Which is to say--not actors, or directors, or producers--but grips, roadies, prop guys. So they have access to a lot of gear, and they get excited about "setting up a stage". Whatever the reason, I give you now a sampling of the results:



There is more to this one, but a big tree's in the way.

That is actually a facade of a haunted house.

The smoke you see is dry ice, that bubbles up from a cauldron on the right every few minutes.

*There is something spooky going on this year, though. For the four years that we have lived here, about 6 houses on the main street into our neighborhood REALLY go all out, every year, for Halloween. Dry ice, loudspeakers shouting boo, dead people falling from trees, the real deal. And this year: nothing. Not one of those houses has so much as a jack o' lantern on the front stoop. I can't figure it out, and now that this weekend is over and there is no chance of a last minute decorating frenzy, I find myself a little pissed off. This is the first year Isaac would be old enough to appreciate such things on Halloween night, and now we get nothing. Hmmphf.