A lesson that always stuck in my brain from “reading” class in elementary school was that fictional stories should have an introduction (moderate), a rising action (long), a climax (momentary), a falling action (brief), and a resolution (very brief). It applies to more than just fiction. For me, this Halloween was a story. August, when the first fickle signs of Halloween started poking out, was the introduction. September and the first part of October, with all their glorious horror movie marathons and decorating binges, was the rising action. The party was the climax. The past few days of reflection and lower key Halloween revelry was the falling action.

Today is the resolution.  More brains…

Plastic skeletons

Corn syrup blood

Cotton spider webs

AMC Fear Fest

Signs at Target that say “Fright Done Right”

Neon colored hair spray

Spirit Halloween stores

Pumpkin beer

Pumpkin bread

Pumpkin anything More brains…

With the Camp Awesome Halloween Hootenanny behind us, and currently being drafted into the annals of history, it’s easy for me to consider Halloween over. But it’s not! There are still two entire days left of revelry, including Phase III!  More brains…

From the moment I got out of bed this morning (about 8:30 am) until right now (11 pm), I have been working on getting the house ready for Halloween. The haunted house, primarily. I left myself time to eat a quick lunch, and a quick dinner, but there was no time for a shower until about 15 minutes ago. From setting up the graveyard to the haunted house dress rehearsal, it was 12 hours of perpetual motion. I don’t remember ever working this hard, for this long of a sustained period of time, on anything. But I absolutely love it. Love of the game was the energy I was burning. It seems practically limitless.

In two nights, I’ll see the fruits of this labor. It will be exciting. It will be chaotic. It will go by in a flash. In certain ways, it may even be disappointing. But I know it will be worth it in the end.

If you’re reading this, you’re probably not the person I need to say this to. But I’m going to say it anyway.

All I ask is that you enjoy the party.

Never have the words “labor of love” been more appropriate for me. As much as I’d like to do so, I can’t dictate when people arrive or when they leave. I’d love for everyone to stay far into the morning hours and stumble away utterly spent, as I will be doing. But for however long you stay, please just have a good time. That is what will make all of this worth it.

See you on Saturday night.

One thing I like about my neighborhood is it gets a lot of trick or treaters. Which is interesting, because it’s a fairly old neighborhood of middle-middle class dwellings, which means it could easily be a trick or treating dead zone. I remember growing up in an extremely similar neighborhood (pretty close by, in fact), and as my friends and I outgrew trick or treating, so did the neighborhood. I still remember lamenting at age 17 that the act of trick or treating may be going extinct, when in fact, the truth was far less depressing - young parents starting families were all going North, to the newer, nicer suburbs of the city. In those places, trick or treating is alive and well. They close off entire streets for it.  More brains…

This is going up quite a bit later than originally planned – chalk it up to the hazards of escalation. But I guess I need to remember that normal people don’t even start thinking about Halloween until a week or so prior, so maybe people will get a use for this.

It’s PUMPKIN BEER ROUNDUP 2013!

I’ll be doing something different this year. Instead of listing, rating, and reviewing every single pumpkin beer that passed my lips, this year’s Pumpkin Beer Roundup will be limited only to pumpkin beers I tried for the first time in 2013, those which have changed significantly enough to warrant another look, or those that have simply changed my mind for better or worse. Whatever you don’t see listed here, you will almost certainly find in my previous years’ roundups.

Without further ado, let’s look at this year’s crop. (Ratings are assigned on a scale of one to five jack ‘o lanterns.) More brains…

If you’re a regular reader of I Remember Halloween, you know that I like things flavored like pumpkin. During the Halloween season, I consume anything and everything I can find in such variety. I eat pumpkin bread, pumpkin muffins, drink pumpkin beer (you better believe it). I drink pumpkin lattes. Just yesterday I had a pumpkin waffle. You get the picture.

But what is the most famous pumpkin flavored treat of all? The answer of course is pumpkin pie. And I, Jonathan Gerblick, do not much care for it.

I wouldn’t admit this for years. Actually, I’d say I was in denial. How could I not like pumpkin pie? It’s pumpkin, and it’s pie. Two wonderful things. I would eat it every year at Thanksgiving, or when it made an appearance anywhere outside that realm. But unless it was smothered in whipped cream I could never bring myself to enjoy it much.

It’s not that I hate the stuff. It’s perfectly inoffensive. But to me it’s bland. Milquetoast. And I still don’t know why I feel that way. There’s no earthly explanation.

You can call me crazy. You can insist that I just haven’t had the “right” pumpkin pie. But friends, I’ve eaten many a slice. I know exactly what it is, and I can’t fall in love with it.

And it’s tearing me up inside.

P.S. I brought myself to make this confession this morning, when I came to work and discovered an entire pumpkin pie sitting out with a note saying, “help yourselves”. I did not feel compelled to help myself.

P.P.S. Pumpkin cheesecake and pumpkin pie/cheesecake hybrids are stellar, and I will speak no ill of them.

I swear up and down to myself every year that I’m not gonna do this.

If you read this site without having to be linked to it from Facebook (it could happen), you might have noticed how new posts seem to trickle off as Halloween gets closer and closer. I always start out strong in September, posting once every three days or so, but by the time October hits I’m so hopelessly, hilariously short on free time, this is what gets put on the back burner.  More brains…

I’ve spoken often in the past of biting off more than I can chew. Of course, year after year, my mouth turns out to be capable of chewing a lot more than I realized. While I’m expecting this year to be no different, I still had the thought, as Becky and I were unrolling 10-foot sheets of black weatherproofing plastic to cover the living room walls, that we’ve truly gone too far.  More brains…

I’m not sure which I enjoy more – Halloween Phase I (September), or Halloween Phase II (October). I love Phase I because it’s so encouraging to watch the remnants of Summer slowly make way for Fall, and keep track of the city’s transition into Halloween Mode (and by extension general Holiday Mode). I’m also a little less busy in September and more able to relax and enjoy it.

But damned if October isn’t a hell of a great month.

More brains…