Yay! EEEK! Halloween 2024 time is here!

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Sep 19, 2018
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6,274
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NJ suburb of Philadelphia
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2003
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I only got one group of kids, 5 of them after 7 pm. So I figured why not? They each got two giant tootsie rolls. They really are big. As they were running away one of them yelled, "Wow, we hit the jackpot!" which gave me a smile.
 
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Beebo Brink

Climate Apocalypse Alarmist
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Sep 20, 2018
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6,211
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2006
Twenty years ago, when we first moved to this neighborhood, Halloween was BIG! We had like 300 kids show up, just a non-stop mob from 6-8pm. Back then -- when we were a lot more energetic than now -- we put on a really big show, too. Mrs. Beebo started planning and decorating weeks in advance and I took the day off from work to prep on the day.

Then, year by year, the number of kids steadily dropped. We still make an effort to decorate, but the display is a shadow of what we used to do, and I haven't updated the music we play. The CD is getting really old and yellow, but it still plays Thriller and various Nightmare Before Christmas songs that I compiled.

This year there were probably fewer than a hundred kids. We figured out pretty quickly that we overbought on the candy, so I started handing huge handfuls of candy to every kid. "Wait, don't leave, have some MORE!"
 

Khamon

Folk Harpist
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Sep 23, 2018
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2,748
Location
Alabama
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2003
Joined SLU
2007
Same here. Neighbors convinced us to purchase twenty pounds of candy twenty-five years ago and we gave away every piece then had to turn the porch light off and lock the door. We are now the last occupied house on the block, post fires and tornados, and all the children are shuttled to trunk or treat type events around town rather than walking the streets. It is safer for them but not as much fun for us except now there are two Hocus Pocus movies to watch!

edited to add that one house had a tree rot, naturally break in half, and fall through causing so much damage that the owner simply moved away. I suppose that qualifies as a natural disaster but we believe that she had no insurance so abandoned it and went to live with relatives. We have a lot of empty houses here that are owned by people who live out of state but will let them fall apart rather than sell them because family heritage.
 
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