On Monday evening I participated in my first Trick-Or-Treat outing. Important: that's Trick-Or-Treat, not Hallowe'en.
I'm over forty-ten years old and have a young family, so it might be appropriate to mention I'm English, living in a country that borrows the very best from the cultures of the world. Well, it makes a change from attempting to take stuff by force, right?
So I took the girls and Ruby dog and we walked the streets, the girls knocking on doors or ringing doorbells in the hope of getting sweeties. ok, candy! They did really well; I'm proud of the way they conducted themselves.
Knock/ring once, wait a respectable length of time, leave the eggs at home in the fridge, you know?
Our neighbourhood did the modern tradition proud. Loads of homes decorated with pumpkins, ghoulish apparitions swaying at doors, even a smoke machine to add, yes, authenticity to the proceedings. There were people of all ages dressed in suitably scary attire and make-up (though my costume and features on the night would win competitions anywhere!)
This year (hopefully the foundation for next) my girls got dressed, applied make-up to appear even scarier than normal, and we went out in what turned out to be the perfect evening, spending that very enjoyable hour-and-a-half going from door to door.
I'm sure my two brought genuine pleasure to at least 2 households others had passed by, it was really great to see.
Amd to think this curmudgeon didn't want to go out, to be sociable. Indeed I'd been dreading it all day.
Eeeee, when I were a lad we never had owt worth mentioning. We got wood once a year and…
… we collected bonfire wood for weeks before Bonfire Night and secreted it away, hopefully out of sight of our rivals. We'd ask for a "Penny for the guy" - a vaguely-humanoid shape supposedly representing Guy Fawkes, but in reality a pile of rags and stuffing to be tossed on top of the woodpile and burnt with as much ceremony as young lads could.
To be honest though, I can't remember if we ever burnt a guy. I recall us burning wood but the predominant memory is the disappointment of having our stash robbed from under outer noses.
Happy days!