Happy Halloween, all! I'm bushed and off to watch one of these fine films. Bushed because I got about 120 kids in just a bit over an hour! (My subdivision has a grade school in it, so most people living here have kids.) Most kids LOVE my house... not for the decorations, but because they not only get a full-size candy bar (or Famous Amos cookies, or chips), they also get a little Halloween-related toy (things like scary 'party favors' that I buy 1/2 price the day after the previous year's Halloween).
You're getting pretty high on my Love List, just so you know
I hope you still have some quality decorations in the yard to back up the sweets inside.
Outside? Not really much at all. Roughly a decade ago I had the third of three head injuries that often make doing even simple tasks exhausting, so I just don't have the energy to spare to do what I'd LIKE to be doing for decorating (which would be basically a personal haunted house in my front yard). But visible from outside I have enough things in the windows that at least let people know that I am 'participating'. And hopefully the kids are more likely to remember the treats (both edible and non) than the decor.
Since I was a kid I loved Halloween far more than any other holiday. Probably why all my life I've wanted a black cat (which I got just over 3 years ago, and is my avatar... handsome devil, eh?) As an adult, one of the things that I find MOST important is the effect of the holiday on children. It is a time of year that lets kids know VERY clearly that most strangers CAN be safe, and are nice enough to give them stuff 'for fun' simply because the kid exists! [95% of all child abuse is done by someone the child knows.] With all the fear-mongering that has gone on (around Halloween and in general), kids NEED that sociological 'safety net' of things like Trick-or-Treating to grow up remotely emotionally healthy [childhood fear results in people being dogmatic (closed-minded)*, which results in them watching Fox News when they grow older, which results in them having no real idea of what is actually going on in the world, which results in them remaining fearful, ignorant, adults]. [[Please note: using "ignorant" in its true sense of 'not knowing', NOT as a pejorative.]]
Love List, eh? Who or what else has ended up on it?
Yes, that's my feelings exactly. Well, on at least half the matter. It is a great night to help get the whole neighborhood to actually meet and greet one-another, to let the kids get sweets and get celebrated for every little thing about them that's different (for those of us that are slightly more different than everyone else, it's even better). Plus, the general Halloween spirit has something for everyone, and the more ways to celebrate that the better.
Well it's a secret list, can't go spilling the beans of what's on it now can I?
I think someone on this site mentioned once they got a bunch of cheap Halloween-themeish DVDs one year and gave them out. That's a kick-ass idea if I ever heard one.
Understood on the secret Love List. Just honored to be on it. *bows deeply*
I was being a little facetious with the Fox News reference (though I do think it fits what Rokeach said he found from his research).
And I agree with your statement "to let the kids ... get celebrated for every little thing about them that's different".
Very very true! 364 days of the year the kids whose interests are 'outside the norm' are thought of as freaks (I, too, was one). That was a time to shine.
And the cheap Halloween theme DVDs would be great, but the cheapest ones I've seen were $1 each. For my sub that'd cost me $120. Not to mention the less-than-favorable reaction parents might give for giving their 2, 3...up to 9 year old a film like the unriffed "Screaming Skull" [which I saw at a party store for $1].
That DOES, however, bring up a thought for the future: the as-yet-un-professionally-released MST3Ks (on the
www.dapcentral.org website, which are *nudge* *nudge* *wink* *wink* 'legal'
*) would only cost about 30ยข to copy per kid! That's actually a tad cheaper than what a 'food item' and toy cost! Something for 'the teens' [in editing: crap I'm getting old, 'the teens'?
really?] like a
Gamera,
Revenge of the Creature, or
Mole Men MST3K (with a reference to the legal ones on Amazon, plus links to RiffTrax and Cinematic Titanic printed on the paper sleeve it'd go in so the kids can find more) might very well be a way to go in the future! Pick a film 'per year' and go with that, or have a few of the as-yet-professionally-unreleased horror/sci-fi MSTs and figure the chances a kid would get the same one in the 3-6 years s/he'd be likely to come back is pretty slim.
Thank you for inspiring the idea (and to whoever it was that did the original DVD distribution that inspired you to mention it)!
Since I JUST bought a 1-to-1 DVD-duplicator recently (when it ejects a disc you just pop in the next blank, roughly 10 mins per disc to burn each copy), that would make it possible to do that without having to start NOW to get 30-40 of them done for any kid over the age of 12 or so by next Halloween. And, since it requires no more thought than "disc ejected, insert next" it could be set up by my home theater chair and I could do it without thinking all evening as I watch other stuff.
*Recently on DAP Central they said that the Info Club had just given them the go-ahead to release a non-Rhino version of Colossal Man (if they can find someone with an original off-air videotape in good enough shape to turn into a DVD). If DAP is being told they can release something by one of the copyright owners, then they are at least grey-area legal (the unriffed film's copyright holders aren't allowing Best Brains to release a version... hence the 'gray-area legal' nature for so many).
