Skipping Hallowe'en

Tell me how you really feel about Hallowe'en.

We did it! We skipped Hallowe'en. Our house was one of those dark houses, all buttoned up, with the inhabitants hiding inside like Scrooges caught up in the wrong holiday.

It was the first time I've ever done that. Do I feel guilty? HELL NO! We saved a couple hundred bucks not giving candy to all those dirty little pot-lickers, scamming us with nary a backward glance. Most of 'em don't even say "trick or treat" anymore, and almost all of 'em don't know how to say thanks. Ungrateful. Greedy little buggers, all of 'em. Screw them all, I say! NO SOUP FOR YOU!!!

I was nervous, though, getting ready for the onslaught. Had to do it early, 'cause the little darlings start early in these parts. Soon as school's out, they take to the streets, pillowcases in tow, a sea of pink princess dresses from Walmart, runny noses, cold feet, whining toddlers, and babies in strollers. Babies. What a scam that is. Everyone complains about teenagers trick or treating - I know damned well it isn't that baby eating those Tootsie Rolls.

So I started at 3:30 p.m. Drew the curtains, closed the blinds. Hung a bath towel from the curtain rod on the front door to close off all the little lace peek holes on the existing curtain. Shut the doors on the bedrooms facing the street. Brought snacks to our back-facing bedroom. Had a shower in the dark. Crept around the house in bare feet. Paced. Hid. When Dave got home from work, I hustled him through the door. "Hurry, hurry," I screamed, as one of the neighbour's kids - excited about the evening ahead - tried to talk to him. "Don't. Encourage. Them," I hissed, as I slammed the door behind him. At my insistence, he dismantled the doorbell, and then turned the Netflix volume high so we wouldn't hear the feeble knocking,  nor the insipid cries of the tiny, hungry, chocolate-smeared zombies that they are.

No, I don't feel guilty one little bit. Their parents all voted conservative in this year's two elections, and with the United Conservative Party's horrendous new budget, who has money for Hallowe'en?

Damned if I'm gonna treat their tiny conservative offspring for that trick.

It's Nano Time!

That's the 2013 Nanowrimo logo. Doesn't it suck? I'm almost embarrassed to post it here. It's like Nano hired some six-year-old with a Commodore 64. Well I won't be ordering a t-shirt this year, that's for sure.

It's 8:23 a.m. here in Cold Lake, Alberta. If you haven't noticed yet, I'm procrastinating. My office is upstairs, calling my name, and yet here I sit on the living room couch, blogging. Oh well. Just a few words here before I head upstairs to write a lot of words. Honestly I don't know what I'm so worried about. I have an idea. I have an outline. I have time and lots of coffee. It's just that starting a new project is so intimidating ... and the doubts – the doubts are enough to send you round the bend. What if I can't write anymore? What if the words don't come? What if, what if, what if???

I could talk myself into a panic attack if I wanted to. I even dreamed about Nanowrimo last night. Oh well. Nothing to be done now except climb the big wooden hill, park my lily white butt behind the desk and start writing.

Good luck to everyone doing Nano this year! If you want to be my writing buddy, look me up. My top secret buddy code name is Matthiasville.

***

One more thing before I go – I had to share this photo I took last night. It's Ben-Ben, our opera-singing cat, sitting in the camp chair I had set up next to the front door for Hallowe'en. There were so many kids (175)  there wasn't a lot of point in moving far from the door – thus the chair. Anyway, Ben sat there quite comfortably, watching the kids come and go. I think he enjoyed the evening more than anybody.

The Fine Print - #fridayflash

The widow of Scarlett Pimm's ex-boss placed a red rose on top of his coffin, then stepped back.

Scarlett watched this from a hill overlooking Craggy Bluffs All Saints Cemetery. Gangly and string-tied, she stood hollow-eyed in the shadow of a dying sugar maple, waiting for the graveside service to end. From this angle the mourners resembled fat black beetles, blundering blindly around the widow, licking up to her painted sorrow like it was a dark jewel. Their shiny umbrella backs swarmed around the widow, carrying her to her limousine on a sycophantic cloud, then skittering to their own mini-vans to follow her for pickle-wrapped sandwiches and tepid funeral tea.

A backhoe rolled in, covered the corpse with dirt, then rolled away.

Scarlett waited for a while, waited until the sun was starting to flatten in the tender sky, waited for the world to forget the man in the hole, then slid down the hill on the skin of her own shadow.

She stood in front of the tombstone, so fresh that marble dust still lay in the letters of his epitaph.

Andrew Joseph Williams 

Born June 1, 1942. 

Died October 28, 2010. 

Husband & Corporate Giant 

Respected by all.

She took the hammer and chisel from her tool belt and began inscribing an epitaph of her own. She had waited 12 years to do this, ever since her job had been outsourced to some febrile curry town across the ocean.

"You may have the people of this community fooled into thinking you are someone honourable but I know who you are," she told him on the day she was fired, "and I am going to put it on your tombstone some day."

He had just laughed at her. Laughed, and had security escort her out the front door.

But now it was Scarlett who was laughing as marble chips flew, as sweat soaked her hair, as grave dirt crusted into the knees of her jeans, as four words emerged on the back of Andrew Joseph Williams' tombstone: Lying Sack of Shit.

She finished by chiselling a neat little asterisk beside his name.

"Unlike you," she said, "I always keep my promises."