Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“And when the Committee says to “report your income,” that could mean anything!

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

When do the post office & the dmv weigh in on the wuhan virus?

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

A consequence of cucumbers

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

The revolution will be supervised.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

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

I was promised a recession.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Because of wow. / Saturday Morning Open Thread: Happy Halloween!

Saturday Morning Open Thread: Happy Halloween!

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Via valued commentor LAMH. I’m hardly an Obot, but this may be the coolest costumed couple of 2015. If you wanna argue, paste a link below!

What’s on the agenda for the day, holiday-related or otherwise?

ETA: Okay, via commentor Dubo, here’s the best adult couple…

Reader Interactions

87Comments

  1. 1.

    Pie Happens (opiejeanne)

    Adorable.

    It’s nearly 2am and pissing down rain here, just outside Seattle. We’re supposed to get 3 inches tomorrow; maybe we should have bought a boat this week.

  11. 11.

    raven

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Look at that sugar! I was at Lil Bit’s eye vet for meds last week and a lady from a rescue group had a blondie. The sweetie was going to lose an eye and they were going to try to save the other so she had a chance to get adopted. I dropped a few beans on the lady on my way out the door and she seemed to appreciate to.

  13. 13.

    raven

    Home Depot opens at 6 and I gotta of get some stuff. I have officially switched back from the person paying for shit to the person doing shit! I got a guy coming in to do gutters and we need some work on the porch fascia !

  15. 15.

    PurpleGirl

    @NotMax: I loved John Zacherly as a kid. My mother couldn’t understand what I liked about his TV show. Saturdays at noon found me in front of the TV watching Zachely. He helped warp my mind

    This afternoon I’ll spend some time in my building lobby handing out candy. I like the idea of the building-wide party in the lobby. I can put up a sign that says no treating on my door and the kids will not ring the bell or knock. And I wear my Yarn Monster costume.

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/10603772573/in/dateposted-public/

    I originally made the costume for a party in Peekskill and it’s become my standard outfit for Halloween. I should start adding to it again. I’ve also worn at work. That picture was taken at my office a few years ago.

  21. 21.

    Elizabelle

    @Baud: Boo back atcha, Baud.

    Happy Howloween and National Children’s Holiday (young and old divisions), to all of you.

  22. 22.

    Elizabelle

    @raven: Am sure you saved someone’s day. Darling pic.

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Neither of your Dropbox photos would load for me, although apparently they did for others. No idea what little you or Nikki was up to …

  24. 24.

    Elizabelle

    Gotta go buy the candy today. Thinking Snickers Bars and Reese’s Cups, because it has to be something delicious left over. Almond Joys. Mounds …. mmmm.

    Don’t usually dress up, but might try to be a zombie … at least, look like one, on the outside too ….

  27. 27.

    Elizabelle

    We get to turn the clocks back tonight too. All that and the glory of Halloween on a Saturday night as well.

    The gods dogs gave us fools for GOP candidates, but bless them for small favors like an extra hour after Halloween, during peak leaf season too.

  30. 30.

    RedDirtGirl

    Our family’s best costume efforts won us first prize at the Oberlin parade, circa 1969. I was a letter, middle sister was a package, and eldest was a letter box.

  34. 34.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: Truth be told, I really am not very fond of this whole changing of the clocks thing no matter which direction it goes in. I will spend the next week or 2 coming wide awake at 2 am and that’s if I’m lucky and not dealing with insomnia.

  35. 35.

    Elizabelle

    Boo. Stephen King has a new collection of short stories out, across genres. (Even a Western.) Interview with him, from the NY Times.

    There’s a story Stephen King can’t resist telling. He was shopping for cinnamon buns and potato chips one day when a woman approached him. She told him that she didn’t care for horror stories like the ones he wrote, and preferred uplifting stories, like “The Shawshank Redemption.” When Mr. King told her he wrote that, too, she didn’t believe him.

    If there are any lingering doubts about Mr. King’s stylistic range, they should be put to rest by his new collection, “The Bazaar of Bad Dreams,” which features 20 stories that seem to touch on every genre imaginable, except for romance. There are crime and horror stories, a narrative poem and a grim western, along with realistic stories about marriage, aging and substance abuse.

    Q. In your introductions to the stories, you often describe how an idea will stay with you half-formed for years, until some catalyst makes you go back to it. Do you write your ideas down somewhere?

    A. I don’t write anything down, any ideas ever, because that’s a good way to immortalize really bad ideas. The bad ideas fall out. It’s a natural Darwinian process. They go away somehow. It’s like throwing a bunch of crackers in a sieve. Some of those ideas shake out because the crumbs get too small, but the big ones stay. …

    Q. You’re in an incredibly prolific phase. What do you think is driving your creativity at this late stage in your career?

    A. I’m not as a prolific as I used to be. There was a time when I published four books a year. As a college student, I had so much in my head that I had migraine headaches. Right now, I’m always happy if I have two or three ideas bouncing around that seem tasty.

    Q. You’ve said that when you’re not writing, if you have a break between books, you have especially vivid dreams. Why do you think that is?

    A. You get habituated to the process, which is very mysterious, but it’s very much like dreaming. A lot of times I can’t remember where these stories came from or what it was like to write them because it’s like being in a trance state when I sit down to write.

    The Bazaar of Bad Dreams. 20 stories.

    I loved his “Different Seasons.” 4 novellas, spawned 3 movies. I took sleep breaks so I could finish Rita Hayworth and the Shawhank Redemption in one sitting. And then the movie was just as good, with changes to reward those who read it and still needed suspense.

  40. 40.

    WereBear

    I am eating breakfast in my favorite cafe prior to grocery shopping. One has led to the other.

    The state of my health made me forgo the traditional trip to the Corn Maze. It was a pretty full moon, clear and cold, night. I haz a sad about that.

    However, couldn’t be more pleased that all the Republican candidates decided to come as clowns and motley fools this year.

  42. 42.

    Schlemazel

    @Baud:

    America needs an independent presidential candidate

    Like a cheetah needs a PS3

    I was going to say, like Jim Webb needs a boiling oil high colonic but then realized he sort of does, apparently there is a severe blockage in his brain passage.

  43. 43.

    Elizabelle

    @OzarkHillbilly: My sympathies. Read Stephen King’s new book, in the wee hours.

    Saw Debra Granik’s “Stray Dog” in a theatre this week. Was it you who thought Ron Hall and others spent too much time in the past, could not let Viet Nam go? Maybe so, but sounds like rural Missouri does not offer a lot of alternatives.

    Stray Dog airs on Independent Vision on PBS November 9th or so — would love if we did a thread about it after.

    Movie’s got a genuine (and very amusing to me) subthread about the stepsons. Talk about pescados out of agua.

  47. 47.

    Amir Khalid

    @Baud:
    Jim Webb won’t be much competition for you, never fear. You have more supporters in the Juicitariat than he does in all of America. I think Webb’s inching toward an independent run is no great surprise. Despite his Sam The Eagle demeanour, he’s a rather silly politician.

  48. 48.

    Elizabelle

    @Iowa Old Lady: Goes on the reading list. Have read very little Stephen King, but like the idea of him. (And his walloping the GOP stupidity in Maine. He’s a brave man.)

  49. 49.

    Betty Cracker

    Get ready to tell your real-life ghost stories, comrades! Gonna put up a special Halloween thread for that purpose shortly!

  52. 52.

    Schlemazel

    @Elizabelle:
    Thanks, I was not that happy with it, I wanted to go with “blender” then “pink Himalayan salt” which I particularly liked because reasons. “As useless as Jim Webb as a candidate” works too.

  53. 53.

    WereBear

    @Iowa Old Lady: Misery is possibly my favorite, and it is outside of his norm. It’s small when he likes to go big, it’s intimate when he tends towards multiple characters, and there’s virtually nothing supernatural about it.

    And it might be the scariest thing he ever wrote.

  54. 54.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Elizabelle: I really get tired of the literary types who put his writing down. The man knows how to tell a story. That’s what really matters.

  57. 57.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @OzarkHillbilly: I don’t know if I’m a literary type, but I’m not a big Stephen King fan. He has two main problems for me: he’s terrible at endings, and his novels are often really bloated. The Stand combines the worst of both problems.

    I prefer his short stories and his non-horror work. He seems to stay much more disciplined in both.

  58. 58.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    Right now I’m sitting around, alternating between surfing and dealing with copy edits. What I’m really doing is waiting for the vet to call with an update on Dirk and a schedule for when he’s going into surgery. Hopefully that will be today, but if not, tomorrow.

  59. 59.

    Phylllis

    No trick or treating for us; off to Charleston for the first place clash between Charleston Southern & Coastal. Game is already a sellout & promises to be a barnburner.

    Eta: Go Bucs!!

  61. 61.

    Baud

    @WereBear:

    Vote Baud and get more sleep. America needs a rest!

    Slide 222 (ZZZ) of my kilopage PowerPoint presentation on why I should be president.

  62. 62.

    Schlemazel

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
    Wishing poor old Dirk a speedy recover, poor little guy.

    I agree with you about King. I admit to not reading much of his stuff (and all of it this horror genre) but it left me really flat. Since then I have learned about his non-horror stuff & heard good thing about it. I might give his short works a try to see if he can win me over.

  64. 64.

    J R in WV

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    Did you like how the typewriter kept giving up another letter?

    Mrs J has 4 typewriters, one is a portable so tough they dropped them from airplanes for combat reporters during WW II. She hated how the typewriter kept giving up another letter every chapter or so.

    Plus it made it harder to read the damned book, which was a great read, one of Mr. King’s best.

    I always felt like his work was uneven, some really good, some, like “The Dome” nearly unreadable. I couldn’t get past 50 or 60 pages in that.

    I have a picture of myself, wearing a tuxedo and a top hat, at a Halloween party some 10 or 15 years ago. If I can get the scanner to work, and such, maybe I can post a link to it.

    I look quite elegant, if I do say so myself. Grinning like I was Dr. J from New Orleans… I should have done all that scanning and uploading work a week ago, but that’s life, always getting in the way of play.

    Happy Halloween, all.

  65. 65.

    Schlemazel

    @Baud:
    Never say in a thousand words what you can say in a thousand powerpoint slides!

    BAUD 2016

    also too, whycome you no got fancy character in you name?
    BAUD~ 2016 . . . BAUD> 2016 ah, I’ll keep working on it & get back to you

  66. 66.

    Satby

    Happy Halloween! My exchange daughters ended up going to a “lock in” overnight party at a church last night, so I had a quiet evening after we carved their first Jack O Lanterns ever! Pretty good first efforts too. I’m enjoying my quiet morning before I go get them in a few minutes.

  67. 67.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Elizabelle: I always had trouble sleeping underground (the lack of sunlight and internal clocks, I think). One expedition, a friend gave me King’s “Insomnia” to read in those early morning hours when I could not sleep and all my team members were dead to the world. First time I had read any of his stuff, not being very fond of the horror genre, and I loved it. Not at all what I was expecting. It was his character development that I liked the most, they seemed like real people, not caricatures.

    Was it you who thought Ron Hall and others spent too much time in the past, could not let Viet Nam go?

    No, not me, never heard of him. Would never dream of saying someone needed to ‘let go of Viet Nam’. What would I know of it? The doc sounds interesting, I’ll look for it on netflix. I loved what Granik did with “Winter’s Bone”. She got these backwoods people to a tee. Mostly they just want to be left alone.

  70. 70.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Amir Khalid: The worry about Jim Webb is that his home, Virginia, is an important swing state these days, and he could peel off some Democrats there: I’m thinking white Fairfax County centrists with defense-hawk inclinations. It might only take a few votes to lose the state, since the vote tends to run really close.

    Then again, if the Republicans run someone really nutty he could be more of a threat to them. He famously beat George Allen after Allen had a racism-on-tape meltdown.

  71. 71.

    MomSense

    @PurpleGirl:

    I love it! My go to costume involves pinning lots of snakes to my hair and curling my hair in snake like rings. I just cut my hair though so I’m not sure how this will all come together this year.

  72. 72.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I don’t put his writing down, but I liked the movie version of “The Shining” much more than the book. Apparently King despised Kubrick’s movie.

  73. 73.

    debbie

    @PurpleGirl:

    I love how New Yorkers adapt to trick or treating. In my building, the mothers of young kids would enlist neighbors to participate. Those who agreed got little treat bags ahead of time (can’t trust anyone!) and then ooh and ahh over the costumes and hand out the bags. And then it was done.

  74. 74.

    Elizabelle

    @OzarkHillbilly: Maybe it was ruckus re Stray Dog. Should go back and check.

    Anyway, it’s a good flick. Slice of a life that most of us don’t live, and protagonist has a lot of humanity and charm.

    I loved Winter’s Bone. One of my top five movies ever. $2 million spent (was it?) and four Oscar nominations. Big roles for Jennifer Lawrence and John Hawkes before they were known. Other terrific supporting actors too, some not professionals.

    I think Granik is saying “look what’s out in the great middle west — it’s a choice of meth, the military, or memories and nightmares of the military. And a lot of good people just trying to get through their lives.”

    Stray Dog’s subplot overturns assumptions.

  75. 75.

    Elizabelle

    @Matt McIrvin: Yeah. I think Webb could be a spoiler in Virginia, and he’d relish doing so. I hope he does not run. Atrocious he might try to take from the Democrats.

    Republicans not going to do shit for his beloved white Appalachians. Never have, never will. Unless they’re mine owners or resource barons.

    Invest in the region’s people? Not a chance.

  78. 78.

    Schlemazel

    @dubo:
    BC (before children) the wife & I went as M&M bags (her plain, me peanut) and once as candy bars (her mounds, me almond joy) a visual pun that good needs a reprise.

  80. 80.

    Hal

    So conservative social media is claiming a third video shows the teen girl in sc attacking that poor officer. I was wondering how long it would be before the alternative, you’re all wrong, stop making this about race etc angle would kick in full gear. It will never cease to amaze and disgust me the number of people in this country that will justify anything police so.

  81. 81.

    NotMax

    @Schlemazel

    Well could have recycled them for another year by turning the letters upside-down.

    “What are you dressed as?”

    “Australian M&Ms.”

  82. 82.

    Elizabelle

    @Omnes Omnibus: From your lips to the FSM. I hope you’re right. Webb has soured his reputation with me.

    He’s not wrong that white males from Appalachia need extra assistance. Couldn’t he do that as governor? Or figure out another project? Retraining for green energy jobs?

    Kicking the Democrats on the way out, and calling them extremists, was poison.

  83. 83.

    Tom

    Making some Greek-style quiche (chopped spinach, feta, roasted pine nuts, sun-dried tomatoes, herbs and garlic) as well as my famous slow cooker veggie chili.

    Apart from that, it’s our weekly movie day so we’re going to see ‘Burnt’.

  85. 85.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    @Omnes Omnibus: Agreed. Webb seems to have a pathological aversion to raising money and getting people involved in his campaign. He was basically drafted to run against Allen for Senate. He did almost nothing to indicate he was interested in keeping the seat once he won it.

    He seems to think that that is going to happen again in a presidential run.

    JimWebb2016 has raised all of $691,972 as of 9/30/2015.

    It’s not at all clear why he’s “running”, but it seems nearly impossible for him to affect the outcome or policies going forward.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

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