Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

A consequence of cucumbers

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Everybody saw this coming.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Spilling the end game before they can coat it in frankl luntz-approved dogwhistles.

This fight is for everything.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Bark louder, little dog.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

Battle won, war still ongoing.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

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Reader Interactions

252Comments

  1. 1.

    Lavocat

    Notice 1) how much smaller the candy is now and 2) how much more expensive it is.

    Trick or treat!

  2. 2.

    Corner Stone

    I’ve got a wingnut who is scared to death about illegal aliens voting telling me NPR ran a story last night estimating some 6.8 M illegal aliens voted in 2008. I can’t find it anywhere, nor any mention of it.
    Anybody hear or see this story recently?

  4. 4.

    Amir Khalid

    We get most of those chocolates in Malaysia, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen Starburst or Almond Joy here.

  5. 5.

    Corner Stone

    @Lavocat:

    Notice 1) how much smaller the candy is now and 2) how much more expensive it is

    Same thing with everything else. Take a look at toilet paper sizes/costs from just a few years ago compared to now. Also notice they made the cardboard roll center wider so you wouldn’t see how much less you’re getting per roll.

  9. 9.

    Corner Stone

    @beth:

    It also had Raisinets – do kids like those?

    Don’t know if you ever buy those mixed bags of different chips? The ones with Fritos, Cheetos, Lays, etc in small one person bags?
    They always put some few bags of some chip nobody likes in those, so you get a mix of the popular ones and some dead weight to put in the cupboard.

  10. 10.

    Amir Khalid

    @Lavocat:
    I remember that in one of his essays, Stephen Jay Gould plotted on a graph the diminishing size of his favourite chocolate bar, and predicted a date early in this century when it would come in a zero-ounce size.

  12. 12.

    Arclite

    That picture is so you, Betty. I knew before I even read the byline who took it. =D

    Happy Halloween!

  13. 13.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    My husband made homemade Mounds Bars a few weeks ago to surprise a friend who loves coconut. I think I’ll go suggest that he make some more this weekend.

  14. 14.

    Elizabelle

    Already had one tiny late afternoon trick or treater; toddler named Abigail dressed as a nurse or doctor.

    @Corner Stone: for wingnuts, every day is Halloween, and we are the ghouls.

    I could not stand to be that het up all the time.

  18. 18.

    Mnemosyne

    I actually got to buy candy this year because our new apartment building does trick-or-treating. I have some Halloween pretzels as well, so I’ll probably give one bag of pretzels and a couple of mini candy bars to each kid.

    I have no idea how the cats are going to respond to trick-or-treaters, but I have a feeling they’re not gonna like it.

  23. 23.

    Elizabelle

    Just watched Carnival of Souls. Fave cult movie. Shot in Lawrence, Kansas and at the Saltaire Pavilion near Salt Lake City for $33,000 in 1962. A near perfect B&W B movie, and the amateur acting works for the unworldliness of it.

    RIP director Herk Harvey, who lived until 1996 and did see his movie succeed on the rebound.

  27. 27.

    Mnemosyne

    @WereBear:

    I haven’t quite made up my mind yet. It’s a secure building, so even if they got out the front door, they would have to figure out how to run to the front of the building, down the stairs, and open the building’s front door to get anywhere. But I don’t know that I would want to deal with the stress of trying to figure out which hallway they ran down.

    What I really wanted was to put up a child gate in the front hallway to temporarily block any adventurism, but none of my co-workers with kids still have one laying around.

  29. 29.

    Chris

    I just want to say… I fucking hate Halloween. I can’t stand the kids coming to my door begging for candy, their insufferable parents, and the parade of young, drunk 20-something amateur drinkers making asses of them selves out at bars. I’m 27 myself, but an uber introvert, and this night is just the worst. Guh. What a horrible night.

  30. 30.

    Keith P

    I guess the kids who are allergic to chocolate leave your house going “FUCK, Starbursts?!!? At least it isn’t candy corn.”

  31. 31.

    Steve from Antioch

    Full size snickers bars or pocket copies of selections from the Book of Mormon – depending on whether they made an effort at a costume.

  33. 33.

    kindness

    I got the giant 150 piece Costco bag of name brand stuff. We live on the outskirts of town and usually only get 5 to 10 kids. Each kid will get a big handful and the rest goes to work with me on Monday.

    Holiday times upon us and there is way better fattening food than candy.

  34. 34.

    Tree With Water

    Just bought candy, but have no idea if kids trick or treat in this neighborhood as it’s my first Halloween in the house. Narrow country lanes, bad lighting make me tend to think not, but I’m ready if they dare (and about 5 lbs heavier if they don’t).

  37. 37.

    EriktheRed

    Like we’ve done for the last few years, we’re taking our butts out of the house and going out to dinner rather than be home to give out goodies.

    It’s not because we’re old cranks, it’s because we have an autistic son who we can’t persuade to stop getting into the candy and it gets very tiresome to guard it all night while waiting to give it out to the kiddies.

    Thankfully – for us, at least – the weather around here is very windy and it’s a bit chilly, too. IOW, not very trick-or-treating friendly.

  40. 40.

    Trollhattan

    Am objectively pro-Almond Joy (and Mounds, notably absent) while the two immediately above would kill me. Literally.

    Thus, I shall instead eat pizza and drink. In several hours, as the sun doesn’t set for quite awhile.

  45. 45.

    beth

    Sigh – some little girl (in no kidding, a princess costume) just told me she didn’t like that candy and could she please have something else? At least she said please.

  49. 49.

    Elizabelle

    @Corner Stone:

    Ah, for f*ck’s sake, from the Bezos WaPost:

    Could control of the Senate in 2014 be decided by illegal votes cast by non-citizens? Some argue that incidents of voting by non-citizens are so rare as to be inconsequential, with efforts to block fraud a screen for an agenda to prevent poor and minority voters from exercising the franchise, while others define such incidents as a threat to democracy itself. Both sides depend more heavily on anecdotes than data.

    … Non-citizen votes could have given Senate Democrats the pivotal 60th vote needed to overcome filibusters in order to pass health-care reform and other Obama administration priorities in the 111th Congress. Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) won election in 2008 with a victory margin of 312 votes. Votes cast by just 0.65 percent of Minnesota non-citizens could account for this margin. It is also possible that non-citizen votes were responsible for Obama’s 2008 victory in North Carolina. Obama won the state by 14,177 votes, so a turnout by 5.1 percent of North Carolina’s adult non-citizens would have provided this victory margin.

    Then authors spend 3 paragraphs backpedaling about extrapolating from very small sample sizes, some self-reported.

    Authors say over 80% of non-citizens vote Democratic.

  50. 50.

    Sasha

    Nice assortment.

    I always hated getting the cheap crap as a child and when I lived in town, always bought good candy for Halloween. Now I live in the country and no one comes down my 1000′ driveway. When my daughter was younger, we always tagged along with a friend who lived in a housing development. We were one of “those” people that vile woman was worried about although we were in the same income level as the neighborhood we went through.

  56. 56.

    Elizabelle

    @kindness: Yup, went the Costco route myself. Gonna have way too much candy left over.

    I loved trick or treating on military bases when we were little. Scads of kids, and some of the parents went way out with scary displays and monsters in coffins.

  57. 57.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    I don’t do Halloween, mainly because of a really bad experience I had with one of my black cats years ago. I turn my light off and stay home.

    Picking up from what John said about the discount stores downstairs, we have one called “Nicks and Dents” and it is brilliant. I can get Diet Coke 2 liters for 99 cents, I can get bags of flour that normally cost me $2.89 for 89 cents (and I use a lot of flour, I bake two or three loaves of bread a week) I usually go there once a month when my DH gets paid and stock up on all the essentials, which means I am never without the ingredients I need for a dinner even if I just thought it up that night. I LOVE these places, they save me a ton of money, and mean that I am never without food in my cupboards. Oh and “sell by” dates and “best before” dates are totally arbitrary. They were invented to make grocers rotate their stocks, they were never meant to say that food is inedible after that date.

    Good example, my local Food Lion has a “sell by” date on its cheese. So when it is nearing that date they reduce it for quick sale. At that point I buy up a boatload, because cheese NEVER goes out of date. It just gets better. I have cheese in my fridge (farmhouse white cheddar) that I bought at a discount in May, and I have put it away (just as you would a good wine) to get better with age. I obviously wouldn’t buy three month old out of date milk, but you have to educate yourself about the shelf life of most food. It is a lot longer than you think.

  60. 60.

    redshirt

    @Elizabelle: I grew up on military bases and in retrospect, loved it. So many kids, and being inside a giant fence gave the parents license to let their kids out and about. Halloweens were always awesome.

  63. 63.

    dmsilev

    Got my candy ready (chocolate bar assortment), but since the Chicago weather right now is “60 mph winds + hail”, I’m not expecting too many visitors. One family so far.

  64. 64.

    NotMax

    @Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    In the area where once lived was a graveyard with a large sign announcing Cemetery of Saints Peter and Paul.

    Whenever had visitors, it became a habit to slow down while driving by, point out the sign and casually mention the graves were therefore Peter Paul mounds.

  65. 65.

    The Other Chuck

    @Trollhattan:

    Am objectively pro-Almond Joy (and Mounds, notably absent) while the two immediately above would kill me. Literally.

    Actually, the “peanut butter” in Reeses Peanut Butter Cups doesn’t contain a trace of peanuts at all.

  66. 66.

    Elizabelle

    @dmsilev:

    Sorry to hear re Chicago weather. Heard it was snowing in Michigan today.

    We’ve got lovely TorT weather in Northern Virginia: briskly cool, with half a moon up there.

  67. 67.

    Jim C

    It’s in the upper 30s, raining and the wind is blowing at 20, gusting to 40. It’s an awful night for trick-or-treaters around here.

    We’re not doing it this year (one of us is recovering from an ailment), and have our light off. Still, we have gotten 5 doorbell rings (as smart as this town thinks itself, these kids don’t know their Halloween etiquette) with an hour to go on the official hours.

  68. 68.

    Elizabelle

    @redshirt: It was a good way to grow up. School did not feel as “cliquey” either on a military base, but maybe that was due to age…

  69. 69.

    NotMax

    @Steeplejack

    I tried to find a bag of bite-sized PayDay bars at the store. No luck.

    Have to go earlier to catch those. PayDay loans are big business these days.

    (ducks into deep cover from pun police)

    If I could find Zagnut here I’d snap that up in a New York minute.

  70. 70.

    Scott S.

    I’ve got Three Musketeers, Almond Joys, Gummie Bears, and Twizzlers — mainly because I don’t like any of them, so I won’t be tempted.

    I have no idea if I’ll get trick-or-treaters this year. It’s the first time I’ve lived in a house, and I have no idea whether lots of kids will be out or none at all.

    Whenever I decide to shut out the light, though, I’m popping the classic 1963 version of “The Haunting” into the machine so I can watch the best horror film ever made.

  72. 72.

    dmsilev

    @Elizabelle: I walked home through a hailstorm, and combed chunks of ice out of my hair as soon as I got inside. I immediately raided the candy stash; I figure I deserved it.

  73. 73.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Corner Stone: I use all the rightwing fretting as an excuse to push nationalized elections with a national ID card, like a SS card with a picture. Solves all the imaginary voter fraud problems AND the real equal protection problem everyone likes to ignore.

    Weirdly, no one ever jumps on board. Almost like solving isn’t the point.

  76. 76.

    Elizabelle

    @Scott S.:

    I love The Haunting. Caught it last week on TCM. The sound effects make that movie.

    TCM has Repulsion on now, and Night of the Living Dead at 8 p. Great lineup today. Did not get much done.

  77. 77.

    Mike E

    Candy pr0n, nice.

    Our long national nightmare NC senate race is nearly over, and both candidates are bringing out the Big Names for last minute stumping… Tillis deployed the Mittbot and Hagan brought Bill and Hill. Unfortunate local teevee news chyron: Clinton In Triangle

  79. 79.

    Elizabelle

    Does anybody anywhere know anyone who actually got a razorblade in an apple?

    I guess this year’s boogycandy will be marijuana-laced whatever.

    Or Ebola Pops.

  82. 82.

    sacrablue

    I bought two big bags of candy at Costco because hubby likes to plop big handfuls into the kids’ pumpkin buckets. Of course at the moment it is pouring rain here in extreme drought country. The rain should be minimal by the 6pm witching hour (I hope since I can’t eat any of the candy).

  83. 83.

    shelley

    The candy isn’t small; it’s ‘fun size!’ Back when Rosie O’Donnel had her daytime talk show, she’d rail about teeny Halloween candy bars and made it her mission to give out full size bars.
    ****************
    Got in a bag each of Almond Joy and Kit Kat. Also had some press-on tattoo’s to add to the mix.
    Very bummed out that there hasn’t been any takers.
    Halloween’s taken a punch here in our neck of the woods. Two years canceled in a row; once for a freak blizzard, the second cause of Hurricane Sandy. Last year it was if kid’s had got out of the habit. Same today.

  86. 86.

    NotMax

    Can’t pinpoint the exact year stopped doing so*, but used to hand out comic books instead of candy.

    *likely when the price jumped to several bucks per issue.

  88. 88.

    Jay C

    @dmsilev:

    but since the Chicago weather right now is “60 mph winds + hail”, I’m not expecting too many visitors

    so, IOW: typical summer weather….

  90. 90.

    lamh36

    In my ‘hood, ya know it’s Halloween when you hear Thriller or some version of it at least 3x or more! I swear, I heard Thriller on the radio when I went in to work and when I left. Have you tried NOT to do the Thriller dance when the song comes on? Shoot, I was driving with one hand, dancing with the other…lol

    I mean, I didn’t learn the whole dance as a teenager just to not perform it cause I’m driving ;-)

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOnqjkJTMaA

    ETA: Oh and yes, I can recite the entire Vincent Price “rap” including the “horror chuckle” at the end.

  92. 92.

    burnspbesq

    I was planning to go for the good stuff this year, but my meeting ran long on Monday and I didn’t have time to hit the Ghiardelli store at SFO before running for my flight. So it’s the same old Mars/Hershey/Nestle stuff, with a bag of Lindt truffles in reserve if we run out. Nothing with nuts, on the off chance that we get hit by one or more kids with nut allergies.

    Weather is crappy (by local standards) in SoCal, overcast and temp in the 60s. If we don’t get cleaned out I’m taking the leftovers with me to a headphone-enthusiasts meetup in Coronado tomorrow so that I’m not tempted.

  93. 93.

    zippity

    My dad always loved Halloween. He never bought cheap candy-and refused to pass out the cheap peanut butter kisses my mom bought one year. He loved to take me trick-or-treating when I was little, and taught me to say, “Trick or treat! Candy for me and a beer for my old man!” Only at certain houses, of course.

  94. 94.

    Elizabelle

    @Mnemosyne:

    Thank you. I am ordering that multi-disk Lewton set, and DVRd Repulsion since I’m too busy candy-dispensing and beer-swilling to catch it in real time.

    Liked I Walked with a Zombie and Cat People immensely. Had seen the 1980s Nastassia Kinski Cat People remake with the David Bowie soundtrack.

  95. 95.

    NotMax

    @Mnemosyne

    It’s on in the background. Had to laugh out loud at the scene a few minutes ago when she nailed a plank over a door (with only one nail on each end) and totally ignored the inch-thick deadbolt.

  99. 99.

    shelley

    @Scott S.: ‘The Haunting’, great , I agree. But also don’t miss tonight on TCM ‘Curse of the Demon.’ Good spooky fun. Love the scene where the good doctor is being chased thru the dark wood by that mysterious billowing ball of smoke.

  101. 101.

    PaulW

    Crunch bars here. two bags, but the way things are going tonight I doubt I’ll give out much. I live in one of those subdivisions where the duplexes are way separate from the family homes, and there’s not many families who live in my duplex cul de sac.

    I dread if I run out of candy though. That happened to me when I lived in a real neighborhood up in Gainesville and wasn’t prepared for the number of kids (I think some were bussed in dammit) my first year living there. I couldn’t turn off the lights because there were still too many families roaming, so I ended up giving out dollar bills (I had no smaller change!) to the last five families that showed at the door.

  104. 104.

    Mnemosyne

    @shelley:

    Also one of my favorites. I have many black-and-white horror movie favorites (and some color ones, mostly Hammer).

    The seance always creeps me out. And I love the conversation Karswell has with his mother as a character moment — you can really feel his desperation to escape what he’s started.

  105. 105.

    shelley

    ya know it’s Halloween when you hear Thriller

    Come to think of it, I haven’t heard ‘Monster Mash’ in years.

  107. 107.

    shelley

    @WereBear: Mine too. But I always regret the actual appearance of the demon at the end. A tad goofy looking, and the way he attacks , it’s like Nelson from the Simpsons,”Stop hitting yourself, why are you hitting yourself?”

  109. 109.

    burnspbesq

    @Corner Stone:

    Not sure what level of sad to ascribe to this statement.

    Sad = 0. It’s a fun way to hear new a lot of new gear that doesn’t have good distribution, and catch up with people I don’t see all that often.

  111. 111.

    shelley

    (and some color ones, mostly Hammer).

    Do you have the ‘Devil’s Bride’? It’s a hoot! Starring Christopher Lee as the good guy for once. And Charles Gray from the ‘Rocky Horror Picture Show’ as the demonic villain.

  113. 113.

    Mnemosyne

    @shelley:

    Yes! It’s a good companion piece to Curse of the Demon since they have somewhat similar stories. I’m not as fond of the later Hammers where they were all about blood and boobs, but most of the early ones (especially their takes on Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Mummy) still hold up really well.

    If we’re going for Christopher Lee movies, I have to put in a plug for the original version of The Wicker Man. Accept no imitations.

  115. 115.

    the Conster

    First trick or treaters I’ve had in 17 years and want to do a happy dance. I sold my big ass empty house in the middle of nowhere to move to a duplex in a busy neighborhood last month. I’ve always loved Halloween, and forgot how much fun it is to see kids all doin’ it still old school. Two girls even had pillow cases. You gotta respect that.

  116. 116.

    WereBear

    @Mnemosyne: If we’re going for Christopher Lee movies, I have to put in a plug for the original version of The Wicker Man. Accept no imitations.

    Most wonderful. Especially do not accept Nicholas Cage imitations. I don’t know when I’ll get over seeing that remake.

  117. 117.

    Mnemosyne

    @WereBear:

    You are correct — Tourneur wanted to stick with his Lewton roots and never show the monster, but the studio insisted. I think it’s a pretty good monster, but I’m a sucker for stop-motion/puppet animation.

  118. 118.

    Elizabelle

    @WereBear: OK. Will tape Curse of the Demon too. Up on TCM at 10 Eastern tonight. They have the demon up in a thumbnail.

    Def DVRing Eyes without a Face overnight.

  120. 120.

    drkrick

    @Joel:

    Ever since Nestle took the cocoa butter out of their chocolate products, the chocolate-heavy bars like Crunch and Hershey’s have been inedible for me.

    How would Nestle changing their recipe affect the taste of a Hershey product? Different companies.

  121. 121.

    NotMax

    @Elizabelle

    A favorite snatch of dialoguw from a horror flick (The Black Cat? – memory fails me at the moment), but only when properly heard in Karloff’s ponderous tones is “The phone is dead. Even the phone is dead.”

  123. 123.

    Elizabelle

    The demon looks a little papier mache, but maybe it’s better moving.

    Lull in kids arriving. Come on big kids. Still a tad too much candy in the house…

  124. 124.

    FlyingToaster

    I got the 250pc bag o little Hersheys, Twizzler, Reeses, Jolly Rancher, and KitKat. We’ve given out about 2/3rds of it — unlike last year, where we had 12 kids, this time we’re closer to 50. And WarriorGirl got two baskets full in 5 blocks, even with half the houses blacked out or with their porch baskets empty.

    Fortunately, WG likes Twizzlers, so what’s left over will do just fine for her.

    Weirdly enough, we only had 3 Elsa’s (including ours); I saw more Harry Potter and Monster High costumes than anything else.

  125. 125.

    MomSense

    I bought lindt dark chocolate with chili pepper for myself. We handed out butterfingers, snickers, 100,000 bars, and starburst. Just came back from trick or treating. Good thing we were on foot because my friends were serving wine with candy tonight.

    Now I have to figure out how to take out all of the plastic snakes pinned in my hair.

  127. 127.

    p.a.

    Good weather but things are pretty slow thus far in the (self-proclaimed) Renaissance City. About $20 remain of original $48 candy investment, and none eaten-yet- by me.

  129. 129.

    Elizabelle

    @NotMax: I look forward to it. Not sure there have been any Karloff movies on TCM today. Bela Lugosi in a few; Lon Chaney in the recreated from stills London after Midnight in predawn hours today…

  133. 133.

    EriktheRed

    No one else at home wants to watch a scary movie for Halloween night. Was hoping to put in John Carpenter’s The Thing.

    Oh well….

  134. 134.

    JPL

    Well my neighborhood goblins came. Actually I had one spiderman and two princesses. The lights go:off at 9 so any stragglers better come soon.

  135. 135.

    Elizabelle

    Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShip Two crashed in the Mojave today. One pilot dead, one ejected and is injured.

    Not a good week for commercial space entrepreneurs.

  136. 136.

    JPL

    @dmsilev: They are expecting snow in the GA mountains and we might get a mix. The wind is suppose to be strong tomorrow but not close to your speeds.

  139. 139.

    shelley

    @Elizabelle: Yes, haven’t seen hide nor hair of the classic ‘Dracula’, ‘Frankenstein’ et al.
    **********
    Talking again about ‘Curse Of The Demon.’ It was adapted from an M.R. James story, “Casting The Runes.’ I have a compilation of his ghost stories, titled appropriately ‘A Warning To The Curious.’
    Check them out sometime.

  143. 143.

    Mnemosyne

    @NotMax:

    You remember (mostly) correctly — Karloff’s character was addressing Lugosi’s character, so it was, “The phone is dead. Did you hear that, Vitus? Even the phone is dead.”

    That movie terrified me as a kid because Karloff being skinned alive is pretty darn graphic. Pre-Code, don’t’cha know.

    @Elizabelle:

    TCM seems to feature different films in different years. Last year was a whole Lewton fest, but other years have been mostly Hammer or mostly Universal, or whatever.

  145. 145.

    rk

    @Corner Stone:

    I’ve got a wingnut who is scared to death about illegal aliens voting telling me NPR ran a story last night estimating some 6.8 M illegal aliens voted in 2008. I can’t find it anywhere, nor any mention of it.
    Anybody hear or see this story recently?

    This whole idea of illegal aliens voting is so ridiculous. I’ve never understood why anyone thinks illegal immigrants have any interest in voting. They’d be so careful trying to avoid authorities and not getting noticed that I doubt they’d risk going into a voting place and impersonate an actual voter. And what’s the upside? Plus most democrats can’t be bothered to vote in midterm elections. I can’t imagine that illegal alien democrats are so highly motivated that they would risk jail time to vote. I was a legal immigrant at one time, but was not eligible to vote. It didn’t even occur to me to vote (didn’t know who the candidates were since I had no say in anything). I wouldn’t have jeopardized my resident status for anything because I’d have lost my job and been kicked out of the country. The idea that illegals are voting is laughable!
    The only thing that surprises me is how idiot republicans believe this nonsense.

  146. 146.

    Elizabelle

    @Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism:

    Thank you. From your link:

    Halloween of 1982 was the year it all went crazy. That year saw a number of tragic and random non-Halloween poisonings of both foodstuffs and medicines, including the Tylenol poisonings that killed seven people. Although the “crazed madman tampering with kids’ Halloween treats” had been an established bogeyman for at least the previous fifteen years (I recall in the late 1960s my mother chopping up every apple I brought home from trick-or-treating and then making pies from them), it was in the aftermath of the Tylenol poisonings that a sudden spate of Halloween tampering reports erupted. It’s as if the murder of those seven unfortunate people opened a forbidden door and now others were free to experiment with playing God, to dispense either life or death as the whim struck them.

    Read more at http://www.snopes.com/horrors/mayhem/needles.asp#k8HOlTKAP6GxSI34.99

    I remember going to a costume party where someone came dressed as a Tylenol capsule.

    They never found the perp, did they?

  148. 148.

    Anoniminous

    @Elizabelle:

    Guy was convicted of sending a ransom note demanding $1,000,000 “or I’ll do it again.” AFAIK he was never convicted of murder.

  150. 150.

    shelley

    @Ripley: Ya beat me to it. A few years ago I read another, updated take on ‘Casting The Runes.’ In this one the curse was delivered by email.

  151. 151.

    gogol's wife

    @Elizabelle:

    Did you watch The Tingler? It was my favorite terrifying movie when I was a kid, but I didn’t remember that they do something with a cat. So when they got to the part where Darryl Hickman was telling Vincent Price that he had trouble catching the black cat, I had to turn it off. But I’m sorry I missed Vincent Price’s L S D trip.

  152. 152.

    gogol's wife

    @WereBear:

    Okay, I was trying to decide whether to turn on the TV for that one. Dana Andrews in a horror movie is a bit of a cognitive dissonance for me.

  153. 153.

    Mnemosyne

    There are three people left in my office, and we’re calling security to come lock up our building at 5:45 pm. Seriously, Halloween is a full-on holiday at the Giant Evil Corporation — very little gets done and people book out early.

  156. 156.

    Mnemosyne

    @gogol’s wife:

    He’ll win you over. He’s the skeptic who’s not entirely sure he buys all of this supernatural hooey. It also works because he’s an American in England, so you have a bit of the fish out of water thing going, too.

    This isn’t anything close to Peggy Cummins’ best role though — that would be Gun Crazy.

  157. 157.

    Raven

    Absolute bedlam on Boulevard in Athens. I didn’t dress up so I got candy duty. Hundreds and hundreds of Kids!

  161. 161.

    dr. luba

    @Elizabelle: It’s only a light sprinkling of snow mixed with rain in SE Michigan, but there are horrible winds and it’s 36 degrees out. Brrrrr. The most miserable Halloween I can remember isn ages……and I’m old.

    I remember wearing a snow suit under my costume when I was a kid, but that was just because it was cold out and my mom made me.

    I bought 2 Costco 150 piece bags of the good stuff (Betty’s assortment less the Starbursts and with both types of M&Ms). Didn’t get home from work until well after 7. Had three kids, and they each got a big handful of candy. I’ve seen a few run by in the street (corner lot) but they seemed to be running home, not stopping. Lights are off and I’m done for the night…..

  165. 165.

    Elizabelle

    @gogol’s wife:

    Saw probably 2/3 of The Tingler. Missed part about the cat. Loved the cheesiness of the creature, and wondered why people in the 1950s were watching what seemed to be a silent movie. But loved the theatre scenes.

    Vincent Price was so good.

    Watched the documentary about The Tingler’s producer, William Castle. He ended up buying rights to Rosemary’s Baby and producing the movie, which people attribute more to director Roman Polanski. It was Castle’s only brush with A-list fare. He sounded like a cool guy.

  169. 169.

    gogol's wife

    @Elizabelle:

    I love William Castle. People actually did go to see silent movies in the 1950s as a nostalgia thing. As a kid I didn’t “get” that Judith Evelyn was a silent film character in a sound film. I just loved the scene where she gets scared!

    William Castle has some fantastic scenes in his movies. I think my favorite is the gal in Macabre who’s blind but drives her convertible all over town.

  171. 171.

    satby

    @the Conster: I’m jealous! And looking forward to the day many years from now when I can bail on Michigassippi and head back to Chicago and have trick or treaters again!

    We didn’t just have snow BTW, we had a mini blizzard with big fat blinding snow clumps coming down. It didn’t last, but it was ferocious with the wind and blowing snow.

  172. 172.

    Elizabelle

    @gogol’s wife:

    Mr. Castle had fun showing up for work, and his daughter seemed like a normal and decent human being.

    John Waters was a big Castle fan; noted that critics detested Castle movies and kids lived for them.

  175. 175.

    Anne Laurie

    @Mnemosyne:

    What I really wanted was to put up a child gate in the front hallway to temporarily block any adventurism, but none of my co-workers with kids still have one laying around.

    NOT a good idea. We use “baby gates” (aka security gates) to keep the dogs away from forbidden areas, including the front door, but the cats leap over them with no problem — don’t even break stride. In fact, we use gates to keep the dogs out of some areas that the cats can use as “dog-free zones” for just that reason.

    There are extra-tall gates, but the cats would probably just resort to climbing the mesh to get over them.

  177. 177.

    NotMax

    @gogol’s wife

    Dana Andrews in a horror movie is a bit of a cognitive dissonance for me.

    Guess it would tilt more into the thriller genre than horror*, but if you can ever catch Crack in the World, do so.

    *Really sort of where the Venn diagram of thriller, disaster film, science fiction and horror intersects.

  180. 180.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Mike J: I only ate there once. I was drunk* and have no memory of what I actually ordered.

    * I was 20 and it was Soho.

  181. 181.

    Shana

    We’ve had THREE kids show up this year. It’s about 9:15 and we’re getting ready to turn out the lights and head upstairs.

    As a precinct captain in Virginia, where we have elections every year, I always save my leftovers to give out to voters on Election Day. My precinct is also a Rec Center so I get swimmers and exercisers as well as voters. I always ask, before handing out sample ballots, “Are you here to vote or float.” Sometimes it even gets a laugh.

  183. 183.

    Kerry Reid

    Picked up a couple bags of Reeses, knowing fully that the kids don’t come into our condo building. But just in case! The witches out in Chicago tonight are probably freezing their tits off in their brass bras. It is COLD!

  184. 184.

    Elizabelle

    Night of the Living Dead:

    “Kill the brain, and you kill the ghoul.”

    They should line them up in front of Fox News.

  188. 188.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Mike J: I lived on the Bayswater/Paddington boundary. There were a few kebab places open until about 2:00 a.m. over near the dodgy, hookery hotels on Sussex Gardens.

  190. 190.

    Svensker

    We always get a bunch of kids who can’t eat peanuts or who don’t like chocolate, so always try to have an assortment for them. But this year, we got a group of Hindu kids who can’t eat gelatine, so that made the gummies off limits. It gets tougher. Still, so fun to see the kids in their costumes, from the little ones who are paralyzed with the awesomeness of the whole thing to the big teens trying to be cool. A great holiday. And the leftovers are a bonus.

  191. 191.

    Mnemosyne

    @Anne Laurie:

    For this specific purpose, I think it would work — the main reason would be to give them a second’s pause of Do I really want to run towards the strange humans or away from them? Over the gate would be towards the strangers.

    But I was unable to find one in time, so the cats are locked up instead.

  192. 192.

    Mnemosyne

    Waiting for my first trick-or-treaters. The person organizing it said they would probably start sometime between 6:30 and 7:00, so hopefully soon.

  193. 193.

    PurpleGirl

    @NotMax: Loved, loved Zacherley’s show. Watched it every Saturday. My mother could not understand why I liked it. (Maybe because she didn’t like it???? No, not really, he made me laugh and that was a big part; how he used hamburger meat and liver, etc.)

  195. 195.

    Betty Cracker

    Tricker treaters are tapering off; looks like we’ll have leftover candy — hooray! I’m watching a godawful Vincent Price movie — Dr. Phives! I met Vincent Price ages ago when I worked at the university performing arts center. He was very kind to an awestruck bumpkin.

  196. 196.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @jeffreyw:

    Fair warning to you, jeffreyw. Next fall I am going to be coming through your area, and I have every intention of doing a Balloon Juice meetup with you, and Tommy, and anyone else who lives in southern Illinois and environs. I have a Met Opera friend in the area, too, whom I’d like to meet in person. There’s nearly a year to plan!

  197. 197.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Betty Cracker:

    I met Vincent Price ages ago when I worked at the university performing arts center. He was very kind to an awestruck bumpkin.

    I have always heard that he was a very polite and kind man.

  198. 198.

    Mnemosyne

    @Betty Cracker:

    I like Dr. Phibes. It’s pretty campy, though (on purpose), so you have to be in the right mood to appreciate it. Closer to a horror comedy, but with some creepy/disturbing parts — for some reason, the death of the guy who gets his head crushed by the frog mask always freaks me out.

  201. 201.

    NotMax

    @PurpleGirl

    Yup yup. He’s still kicking, well into his nineties now.

    Have mentioned this before, but met him once (albeit briefly; even more personable and nice than one would hope) at the after party for a movie premiere. We were seated at the same table. To this day don’t know what the drink was which he ordered, only that it was gray. Deep gray.

    “Good night, whatever you are.”

  203. 203.

    Mnemosyne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    He worked closely with East Los Angeles College and endowed a museum there with a large part of his personal art collection — they were recently able to build a really nice new facility for their current collection. He was a huge believer in arts education and wanted to make sure that students in the poorer parts of Los Angeles would have access to fine art.

    ETA: IIRC, dance around in your bones once sold an Oriental rug to Vincent Price. Because of course she did. ;-)

  204. 204.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @SiubhanDuinne: I am ever so envious. Aside from Sherlock Holmes fame, he was an awesome villain in swashbucklers. He also won an M.C. during WWI for sneaking out in between the trenches to do in person observation while serving as his unit’s intel officer.

    @Mnemosyne:

    IIRC, dance around in your bones once sold an Oriental rug to Vincent Price. Because of course she did. ;-)

    As you said, of course she did.

  208. 208.

    Ruckus

    @rk:

    The only thing that surprises me is how idiot republicans believe this nonsense.

    There is nothing that idiot republicans(but I repeat myself) will believe that surprises me. We call them idiots for a reason.

  212. 212.

    hilts

    @Chris:

    I fucking hate Halloween.

    Me too. I’m glad to find someone out there who thinks that Halloween is a gigantic crock of shit.

  213. 213.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Steeplejack: I actually co-wrote a screenplay several years ago (it got an honorable mention at the Cleveland International Film Festival that year) which featured a discussion of that very point. As long as I am bragging, the short film we entered was shown at the festival as well.

    @Elmo: Interesting undercurrent of fondness for Mr. Rathbone flowing through the commentariat.

  215. 215.

    Mnemosyne

    @Steeplejack:

    IIRC, according to Danny Peary (in one of his classic Cult Movies books), Tourneur’s plan was to only show the demon at the end, and the dispute was that the producers insisted on putting it at the beginning as well. That probably would have worked better since it would have been a pretty terrifying reveal.

    (I suspect that Peary is right because the demon appearance at the beginning seems quite tacked-on compared to its suspenseful appearance at the end.)

  218. 218.

    Elmo

    @Omnes Omnibus:
    We are a sophisticated bunch with educated tastes. I have seen every single one of his movies multiple times, including Hellzapoppin, and I have all his radio plays. I was obsessed with him and Leonard Nimoy as an adolescent.

  221. 221.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Elmo:

    We are a sophisticated bunch with educated tastes.

    That sure sounds a lot better than saying “We’re a bunch of weirdos.”

  222. 222.

    Mnemosyne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    That’s why I love The Haunting so much — you never actually see anything, although you always think that if they would just move the camera a few inches, you totally would. But it can be pretty powerful to finally show the monster at the end after hinting at it during the rest of the film. As I said, the appearance at the end seems much better staged than the appearance at the beginning, so Tourneur was probably right.

  224. 224.

    Steeplejack

    @Mnemosyne, @Omnes Omnibus:

    Not just the demon’s early appearance but its cheesiness sort of deflates the rest of the movie. A late reveal, no matter how cheesy, leaves less of the movie to be damaged.

    When the guy first saw the demon approaching, it looked like a ball of smoke. (I haven’t watched this movie in years and have forgotten a lot of the details.) That would have been fine for most or all of the movie.

    Dana Andrews was wearing some big-ass cufflinks for a while, but now he’s changed out. Weird how you pick up on odd details like that.

  225. 225.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Steeplejack: Thanks.

    @Mnemosyne: My tastes may be jaded by years of better special effects, but I just don’t find that demon to be scary. At the same time, Lon Chaney in the original Phantom of the Opera was brilliant.

    @Steeplejack

    : When the guy first saw the demon approaching, it looked like a ball of smoke. (I haven’t watched this movie in years and have forgotten a lot of the details.) That would have been fine for most or all of the movie.

    All. TYVM

  232. 232.

    Steeplejack

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Yup.

    Finally remembered the movie I was trying to think of where the late reveal is much, much better (although the monster is not cheesy): Forbidden Planet.

  236. 236.

    Steeplejack

    Gonna have to finish this movie tomorrow. Rare sinking spell, and I need to go to bed. Plus I’m house-sitting at my (non-RWNJ) brother’s house, and the sighthound is letting me know it’s past her bedtime, too.

    ETA: Whatever is the opposite of screen magnetism, Peggy Cummins has it.

    ETFA: What the hell? Just realized this movie only has another 10-15 minutes to go. I can hang around for that. I guess it has been a bit leisurely so far.

  238. 238.

    Omnes Omnibus

    I again assert that the ball of smoke would have been more than sufficient.

    ETA: The stop motion demon ruins the movie for me.

  239. 239.

    Steeplejack

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Agreed, cheesy monster is cheesy. The smoke-wreathed train bearing down on you is quite frightening enough and could be freighted with sufficient supernatural overtones.

    Okay, it’s official: Robert Osborne blames Hal Chester for all the cheesy-monster dick moves.

    The other thing about the early reveal of a cheesy monster is that you (the audience) then expect it to keep reappearing, and when it doesn’t you get disappointed, even if only subconsciously. I was misremembering this movie as being longer than it is because I was expecting the monster to appear.

  241. 241.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I was just expecting more stuff to happen. Something slightly off about the pacing. And once you’ve shown the monster it’s hard—unsatisfying to the viewer—to drop back to psychological menacing.

  242. 242.

    Mnemosyne

    @Steeplejack:

    ETA: Whatever is the opposite of screen magnetism, Peggy Cummins has it.

    You need to see Gun Crazy. Go find it tomorrow. It will completely transform your view of Cummins.

    We just started watching it and the better way to do the initial view of the demon probably would have been the glowing cloud, and then that shot of the giant foot next to the professor’s body. That probably would have been sufficient. Showing the whole demon at the very beginning removes any possible suspense.

  243. 243.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Mnemosyne: Not even the foot. Ever. I swear that this is a movie I would have found wonderful but for the cheesy demon. Use the unseen; it appears that the director and others knew that, but pressure from above won out.

  244. 244.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    @Mnemosyne:

    She was great in Gun Crazy but a cold fish in this one. But there weren’t any pheremones wafting off Dana Andrews either.

  247. 247.

    Steeplejack (tablet)

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Like a lot of “leading men” of the ’40s, he didn’t age well. Excellent in Laura and The Best Years of Our Lives, and The Ox-Bow Incident is truly wrenching.

  248. 248.

    Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)

    Alright, lady, what’s the deal with the Hershey bar w/out almonds? You think we’re going to make s’mores later on?

    Alright, boys, bust out the t.p.!

  251. 251.

    gogol's wife

    @Steeplejack:

    I understand their impulse — if you didn’t know there were real demons, then you wouldn’t be as exasperated with Dana A. But for me the scariest scene was the seance. You think the medium is a fake but then Maurice Denham’s voice comes out of him — terrifying! You really didn’t need the demon after that.

  252. 252.

    Hunter

    Oh, have I got candy. I wasn’t really expecting a lot of trick-or-treaters (I live in a large building with a buzz-in entry), but figured I’d better have something on hand, just in case. Then the weather got absolutely horrible in the afternoon — 37 degrees, north wind at 35-40 mph (gusts up to 50), and mixed rain/snow.

    So yeah, I’ve got candy.

    So today I’m going to try to remember to vote — there’s an early voting location en route to my usual haunts, which is easier to get to than my polling place. That way, it’s done.

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