I knew my internal scribe was out walking a picket line with the Writers Guild of America when I considered titling a blog post “Maui wowie.”
Clever? Maybe. Funny? Most definitely not.
It’s been a bit of a rough patch for an old newsie who doesn’t give a fiddler’s fart about Barbie, the Iowa State Fair, Taylor Swift, a fish-slapping dance involving Zuck and Schmuck, Hunter Biden, or the latest freakout over artificial intelligence. (Texting Jesus?Seriously? Dude’s only been Holy Ghosting you people for a couple thousand years.)
We’re just 13 days into August and already I’m being served Halloween-related ads as I shamble around the Internets in search of inspiration.
But I’m having trouble envisioning anything more horrific than getting chased into the ocean by the deadliest American wildfire in more than a century and hearing later that some blogger made a lame joke about it.
Just a sec; gotta block this Jesus dude. He wants to know why the poor sods in Lahaina didn’t just walk to the mainland instead of jumping into the sea.
“That’s what I’da done,” he texts.
“Not with those holes in your feet,” I reply. “You’re not seaworthy anymore, skipper. More leaks than Ginger Hitler’s White House.”
All Hallows’ Eve at El Rancho Pendejo was a total blowout, but not the kind one hopes for.
Some aspect of PNM’s power project in the ’hood unplugged half the cul-de-sac, including our place.
Around midmorning I saw a few trucks pull in and park, disgorging their hard-hatted contents into a neighbor’s yard. And so when a couple minutes later The Compound went dark I trotted out into my yard and spied them beavering away at some task beyond the wall.
“Hey, guys, the power’s out here,” I sez to ’em I sez.
“Oopsie,” they sez to me they sez, or something very much not like that.
Over we go.
Long story short, an autopsy found a transformer had been terminated with extreme prejudice and would not arise in three days or even three years. It would have to be replaced.
In case you were wondering, this is a tad more complicated than swapping in a new fuse after you try to run the box fan and hair dryer simultaneously in the ol’ singlewide.
The defunct transformer was in some impossible cranny in the yard, because of course it was, and the hard hats couldn’t just sherpa a new one in there. Superman was taking a meeting with James Gunn and Peter Safran at Warner Bros-DC, and the Hulk said he wouldn’t work on Halloween.
“This is gonna take some doing,” grumbled one hard hat, giving me the side-eye. Hey, boss, I didn’t hammer a stake topped with a Hillary 2024 placard through your transformer’s heart. I was camped in my office, pounding out the fake news, and free of charge, too.
Or I was until the power went out, anyway.
But I keed, I keed.
What happened next was nothing short of amazing.
We — or at least I — have grown accustomed to the “sucks to be you” school of customer service. “We can pencil you in for between midnight and 4 a.m. on Feb. 31st, if that works for you, or even if it doesn’t.” That sort of thing.
But these dudes got right after it. They disappeared for a while, and I was anticipating a long wait for them to return, perhaps bearing electricity, or more likely, excuses.
Nope. In fairly short order the cul-de-sac was clogged with pickups and flatbeds and a big-ass crane, and before you could say “Thomas Edison” the crane was hoisting a new transformer over the neighbor’s roof and into the yard.
Jack-o-taillights.
As dark fell the hard hats were eating pizza from boxes on the hoods of the trucks, and we were eating jambalaya from bowls, and everyone was watching the crane operator perform his magic.
“That’s something you don’t see every day, hey?” said a hard hat.
For real.
We lit our plastic pumpkin with battery-powered Cygolite tail lights, brightened the front walk with their companion headlights, and used a couple rechargeable lanterns indoors (Biolite and Nite Ize).
But with all the goings-on in the cul-de-sac most of the neighborhood trick-or-treaters decided to give us a pass. Herself handed out some treats to the hard hats, but we have plenty left over. It was easily our worst turnout since the height of the Plague Years.
But the power’s back on, and the hard hats popped round this morning to double-check their work. Well done indeed.
Nothing says Halloween like a plug-in plastic punkin.
I used to love Halloween. It was my favorite holiday by far. Who doesn’t want to be someone or something else for at least one day per annum?
Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird … it’s a plane … no, it’s The Kid with the Giant Head!
Mom made more than a few costumes for me: Superman, Mike “Sea Hunt” Nelson, even one of my own cartoon characters, Loadedman.
I can’t remember how the hell I talked her into that one. Surely I never let her read any of the comics. They did not promise a future of fame and fortune for Your Humble Narrator.
Eventually I started cobbling together my own getups, but found my options limited by my everyday appearance, which was long on hair. The pirate thing is easy, but gets boring after a few voyages.
So I stretched myself a bit. I was Chihuahua Guevara one year, and Jesus another. The Che getup was easy — basically pirate, but with assault rifle and beret instead of cutlass and bandana — but the Prince of Peace required a little more skull sweat.
Chihuahua Guevara, Fido Castro, take your pick.
It was a combo act. A newpaper colleague and I planned to crash a divinity-school party as the Deities from New Jersey, with accents to match.
Robes and halos were a snap, and I used green trash-bag ties to fashion a crown of thorns, but we couldn’t talk anyone into joining us as the Holy Ghost. Something about “blasphemy.”
Yeah, right. Like we weren’t already going to Hell for running an afternoon newspaper.
One aspect short of a Trinity, we were forced to improvise and adapt. In short, to evolve. We bought a white helium-filled balloon and slapped a happy-face sticker on it. Hallelujah. The Lord helps those who help themselves.
At another newspaper I managed to catch the publisher napping one All Hallows’ Eve. I throttled back my prodigious beard, then braided my hair and stuffed it down the collar of a very pro dress shirt. Took out the earring, added tie, slacks, and footwear, and went to work.
Well sir, I don’t mind telling you the publisher was impressed. Shook my hand and congratulated me on finally joining the human race.
Later I left for lunch and returned clad in motorcycle-outlaw finery — all hair and earring and black boots and denim, including a vest with homemade “Hell’s Editors” colors on the back and a “No Morals” button on the front.
The publisher subsequently went dotty. I like to think I contributed in my own small way.
These days I mostly play it straight. We hang around the house and wait for all the little goblins to pop round, screeching for sugar.
If anybody asks what I’m doing for Halloween I tell them I’m going as an old white guy. I can’t imagine anything scarier.
Man, am I ever glad I doubled up on the sugar stash. We had a veritable thundering herd of trick-or-treaters last night.
We had been thinking that turnout would be on a par with 2020 — basically, the kids in the cul-de-sac and their minders. But some Voice from the Other World suggested I snatch up a couple more bags of goodies when I was in the store the other day. And as soon as I locate a Ouija board I’ll thank him/her/it for the tip, because the little goblins started hitting the doorbell at dusk and didn’t quit until we croaked the lights at 9 p.m.
Maybe it was the light show. Ordinarily we just plug in the Not-So-Great Pumpkin, set it in my office window, and call it good. But this year I gave it some bush-league mad-scientist backup, planting six bicycle taillights around it to add an eerie red glow: three big Busch-Müller jobs that cast a steady light, and three smaller Cygolites set to “Zoom” mode. Muah haah haaaaaah.
More likely it was just some cabin-feverish parents deciding to air out their munchkins for a couple hours. “No, we’re not watching ‘Frozen II’ again. Now put on this Wonder Woman costume and let’s go make your dentist crazy.”
Whatever. It fairly made my shrunken black knuckle of a heart go all pitter-pat. Halloween has always been my favorite holiday. You get to be somebody else for a day, or at least part of a night, and who doesn’t want to climb out of his or her boring ol’ skin for a spell at least once a year?
With all the evil news-droppings poisoning our spiritual wells day in and day out, it was comforting to see that we can still trust each other a little bit, share a moment now and again.
“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. … oh, wow, Mom, Snickers!”
Nothing says Halloween like a plug-in plastic punkin.
Here we are again, All Hallows’ Eve, boogity boogity boogity.
I don’t have any idea what to expect, trick-or-treatwise. Last year we kept our lights out and restricted candy distribution to the neighbor kids and their keepers. The supplicants included two cats, one cow, a fairy, a princess, and Wonder Woman. The booty was sealed in individual Ziploc bags. We didn’t quite toss it at them from the roof.
“G’wan, gedoudaheeh, y’little Petri dishes! I’m warnin’ ya, I got a bucket a hot bleach up heeah!”
In other news, Ken Layne is back from the road just in time to crank out a Halloween episode for Desert Oracle Radio. Author Tod Goldberg joined him to tell a spooky story, and I liked it so much I dashed right over to Page 1 Books and bought one of his books, “The Low Desert,” a collection of short stories. The first was worth the price of admission. There is a scary clown. I shall say no more.
Me, I don’t have a scary story for you today, or even an original costume idea. I’m dressing as Old White Guy, just like always, because in these dark days I can’t think of anything more frightening. Boo, etc.
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