HALLOWEEN!!

Other then football and family, it was a pretty slow weekend. This weekend will be different though because it will be as busy as busy gets. Thursday I have a bachelor party for a fraternity brother of mine, Friday we are having our annual Halloween party at our house, and then on Saturday, we will be attending the wedding for the same said fraternity brother.  The best thing about the wedding this weekend? It's Halloween themed! Complete with ditch the suit and ties and don the Halloween costume for the wedding and reception! Score!!

The family reunion went real well and without a hitch.  I think everyone who came had a real good time and I know my mother was pleased with the number of people in attendance.  She did a real good job and I think it was so successful that the "Cart/Ralston" reunion might now be a yearly event.

Football also went real well last week after a rough start. I only went 1-2 in my CFB picks, but I went 3-0 in my NFL picks to go 4-2 for the weekend and a big plus in the money department.  Additionally, KSU looked great in whooping that WVa ass, and they moved up to number 3 in the BCS polls.  They still have some tough games on the horizon, but it's one game at a time.  My KC Chiefs were on their bye week this last weekend, which means they finally didn't lose a game.  Even on the bye, they are so bad, I thought it was still possible that they might lose without even playing. Oh well, here's looking at finally drafting a quarter back in this year's draft. Barkley, Jones, Smith, Klein?  How would it look if the HBCK (honey badger Colin Klien) himself, Optimus Klein were to dawn a Chiefs jersey next year. He's big, slow, but can play like a mother. Ben Rothlisburger has two rings, why not Klein?

I love Halloween.  Always have.  I can remember as a little kid decorating my room or the basement as a haunted house and making my family or friends go through it.  It wasn't ever scary and it never lasted long, but it was just the process of getting everything out, decorating everything, trying to scare people.. . I loved it all. Every year, I always spent hours trying to decide on just the right costume. Scary, funny, over the top: I've done it all. My love of Halloween hasn't changed, even 20 years later. In fact, my infatuation with Halloween has probably only gotten worse.  The number of tubs we have filled with Halloween stuff in them now rivals the number of tubs we have for Christmas, which is a lot.  We even have our own traditions around our house much like everyone else: the wife is in charge of decorating for Christmas (except I still do the exterior lights) and I decorate for Halloween (inside and outside). We both go to the extreme, but I think going over the top is what the burb's is all about.  Outdo your neighbor. Be the best. he who has the most lights wins.

Every year we have a Halloween party at our house and invite all of our friends and family over.  We try and create a theme around it (last year it was Heroes and Villain's), and I always take up until the last minute to decide what my costume will be. I go all out every year for Halloween. decorations inside and out. Masks, costumes, wall hangings, scary sounds and spooky lights. We have tombstones and graveyards, window hangings, and shrunken heads. I'm the Clark W. Griswold of Halloween on my block, and I'll be damned if I'll get beat in any year of competition. The food spread is even more grandiose then the decorations. Everything is Halloween related so little smokies become alien fingers, deviled eggs are eyeballs, and everything, like hell, is hot. Hot salsa, hell dips, inferno bat wings, and devil fire mummy balls.

Yeah, it's all over the top, but for me, it's still one of the few times each year that I can revert back to being a kid. Even with our own kids now just a wee bit older, it's become a shared experience for all of us.  The kids love Halloween. They love decorating for Halloween and planning for the party.  This will be the first year where we will be having a kid friendly party, and we'll lose some of our kid less regulars who don't want to be around all these parents and their little witches and warlocks, but now we can spend it together. Plus the wife hates it.  The sluttier the costumes get each year, the less she likes Halloween.  She's not big on dressing up to begin with. Like I said, she's Christmas and I'm more Halloween, but she still works with it. I'll post pre and posat party picks from this year's party.  We get to combine the Halloween costumes and wedding costumes this year, so at least we get to wear everything more then once and get our monies worth out of it. It should still be a great time and how can it not when your kids go from this:

 

To this: Man they grow up fast. Must be something in the water.