More Hallowgoodness

Another permanent display of All Hallow's Eve in our home - this time in our daughter's bedroom. She is our Halloween baby (and the reason for our annual party and yard display). We keep this stuff up year-round and add to it from time to time - it's kind of become just another part of the house - we hardly notice it anymore. Actually, now that I think about it, I'm kind of surprised my wife lets me keep this up...

Out - out are the lights - out all!

At 8:30 p.m. tonight, why not light a few candles and switch off all the lights? Not only will it give you a great opportunity to tell some spooky stories in the dark, but it will help reduce your carbon footprint.

http://www.earthhour.org/home/

Leave It To The Onion...

Priceless. That's all I can say... Priceless.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0McggLIYmnE

Pumpkinjuice

Everything tastes better out of a pumpkin. I was thinking how difficult it is to find anything Halloweenish in Minnesota in late March, when it occurred to me that upon closer inspection I have a plethora of Halloween-related gewgaws around the house. These macabre items are such fixtures in our home that I seldom think about them or consider them to be October fare.

Above are a few coffee cups we've picked up over the years. Front and center is my favorite - a jack-o-lantern mug I bought on clearance at Target (75% off!) a few weeks after Halloween. My mom has a similar one at her place that I've always coveted (and still do...) and I'm always quick to pull that one out of the cupboard and fill with whatever is on hand. The irony is this: I don't drink coffee. I typically fill my cup with Ganoderma, an instant coffee beverage made from ganoderma mushrooms and coffee beans. As I am highly sensitive to the effects of caffeine, I opt for ganno, which has all the buzz of coffee without the cranium splitting side-effects.

For info check out: www.gemherbs.com

I'll have to look around and see what other Halloween thingymabobs we have around the place. If nothing else, this early-spring exercise in boredom gives me good practice at low-level lighting photography...

Hallow Goodies

In my last post I alluded to the absurd amount of Halloween bric-a-brac that we have been accumulating since November 1st of last year. Today I decided to brave my way into the cramped confines of our crawlspace to show just a small sampling of the Halloween goodies we have building up in there. Behind me - what you can't see behind the Wizard's curtain - are about seven or eight full-sized Rubbermaids filled to capacity with the exactly one-half of our Hallow-gear (the other half is stored in our garage...)

Sick Again

So I'm sick again. This makes five colds since Thanksgiving - although I'm starting to think this has all been one long cold and the short intervals of wellness are just a part of it. Meanwhile, I have been eating more fruit in the last week than I have eaten all of last year: tangelos, bananas, apples, grapes, oranges... and washing it all down with orange juice or apple juice. Thank God that spring is only about three weeks away! The temp today is supposed to be near 40 (and 47 tomorrow!) so hopefully I can get some sunshine and finally kick this thing.

The writing is going really well (although I have found it hard to get motivated when you're not feeling 100%). Yesterday I was laying in bed feeling miserable, deciding I wasn't going to write for the day. When out of the blue I had a sudden inspiration and bolted out of bed. I hopped on the computer and hammered out one of those chapters that makes you pump your fists in the air and say "Yessssss!" when you're done. It was a really good feeling and just what I needed when the temptation to not write reared its ugly head.

As for Halloween - I recently ventured into our crawlspace to find a can of paint and was amazed at the treasure trove of Halloween goodies I found. It's amazing at how much spooky stuff we pick up through out the year - bargains, discounts, clearance items, gifts, etc. I don't want to drag out the Halloween bins to put this stuff away so I've been piling it in the crawlspace for the time being. All Saints Day (the day after Halloween) was a banner day for us - we picked up a ton of new decorations at half price at Target and other places - so we have a lot of brand spanking new things to look at when September rolls around!