Thank you for finding That Old House amidst the chaos of the Internet. We are delighted that you are here.

Monday, November 5, 2012

Whoa! Creepy Guest on Fake Halloween!!!



BOO!
Last Wednesday was Calendar Halloween,
but because of Superstorm Sandy, our mayor
moved the holiday to Saturday, and then our
governor moved it to today, Monday.


So we have been prepared for
Trick or Treaters for 5 days.
Halloween decorations are still up.

The 3 Musketeers Bars are snuggled in their basket, waiting.
Howard and I have been keeping each other honest.

Black paper bats are great fun at Halloween.
Back in 2010, I had them all over our fireplace wall.

In real life, bats are not as cute.  Read on.

We've had no trick or treaters yet.

Unless you count this one, which Howard
found when he went to take pictures of
another disconnected gutter on our second floor:



Yeah.  A real bat!  Hanging inside a bedroom window.
Talk about Eeeeeekkkkk!

This poor little guy had somehow squeezed himself between the screen and the storm window.  It took some finagling to free him.  Sadly, he had perished before we even found him.  We like our bats here at That Old House.  They do a bang-up job of keeping our yard pretty much mosquito-free, and they are also kind of neat when they fly out overhead on summer nights.

As long as they don't nest in our attic, they are most welcome.

No jokes now, about my being batty.
'Cause we all know . . . I am.
*************************************
Also still decorating the porch and the side yard,
our Jack-O-Lanterns.

It's hard to get good pictures of them because it is DARK
when they are lit.  Duh.


Daughter Anne's haunted house pumpkin.
Carved days ago, by last night it was showing its age and
beginning to crumple in on itself.
Carved pumpkins don't have much of a shelf life.


And what would Halloween be without a 
Shoe-O-Lantern?
My handiwork.  Oy.


Tonight we'll candle up all 4 of our carved masterpieces,
and hope that we get at least one group of trick or treaters.

Who don't have fur, wings, and hang upside down.

********************************
Sunday night was our last normal dinnertime until next weekend;
Howard doesn't get home from work until 10PM during the week.

So I set a very casual Halloween table, and served up what I realized,
after I filled the serving dishes, was just
about the whitest, most colorless, dinner possible.

Really.

Cauliflower.

Mashed potatoes.

Roast chicken bazooms.

Remember when every home in every home dec magazine was
slathered in white and beige?   Page after page of . . . no color?

This is the dinnertime equivalent of that.

At least I had bright place mats, and Halloween napkins I sewed back in the day, when I sewed dozens of napkins for all occasions and holidays.   Hey, getting your first serger is a heady experience!

If you are in New Jersey,
Happy Halloween on this November 5th!
And I hope you have power by now; so many still out!


Now I need to find a roofer and a gutter guy (do gutter guys have
names?  Gutterer?).  I know we'll be at the bottom of their priority
list, as we still have a roof even though it's compromised,
but I completely understand that.  

Tuesday, Election Day -- A Post about Dylan our new dog,
and how our beach house fared in Sandy.  And remember to vote!
-- Cass


7 comments:

  1. It's nice to hear how some out East are handling and dealing with the aftermath of the storm.
    Life does go on...and we take what we are given.
    That real bat... interesting! We had some of those in our barn a few years (about 10 yrs) back. They came because of the fruit trees around our place.
    Hope you get some trick or treaters... and I know they'll be happy to have some snickers!

    Pat

    ReplyDelete
  2. Eek -- a bat almost in the house! I'm sure he was trying to get away from Sandy? It wasn't the bedroom we stayed in was it? I have to hid my Halloween Candy too -- I make sure there is ONE each saved Halloween night -- it's our second dessert -- but if I didn't there would be nothing to hand out Halloween -- Jim likes his chocolate!

    I wish I could send our roofer and gutterer your way! Services like that are really inexpensive here (along with taxes!)

    I do hope the beach house fared well --

    BTW, Dolly says "hi" to Dylan.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Maybe we will bring our kids to your house to trick or treat since Halloween is cancelled here because we STILL have NO power!!! Can you believe it! Glad to hear you are up and running! Happy Halloween to you Cass and I am glad you had minimal storm damage!
    -Shelley

    ReplyDelete
  4. Ewwwww! I would freak out if I saw a bat here. So sorry you have some gutter damage. Your chicken dish looks delicious.....Christine

    ReplyDelete
  5. Cass,
    We do Halloween way ahead of schedule, as in it was October 25 this year. Well ahead of Sandy, thankfully. It was a beautiful night.
    I am anxious to know how your beach house fared....well, I hope! And I am already a big fan of that charmer, Dylan!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Those all white meals can be very delicious!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Happy Halloween, Cass! Although your dinner was a little colorless, it looked good! And I am still in awe over your shoe pumpkin!

    We had the same thing happen at the lakehouse...a bat getting wedged between the screen and window. It had also expired by the time we got to it. But...we also had them in our attic, a lot! Long story and not pleasant. I once was caught in a swarm of them one evening on our covered patio. Another long story. I'm not crazy about them.

    Hope your beach house is okay. I'll be tuned in tomorrow.

    XO,
    Jane

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for visiting That Old House; it's always exciting to find new comments -- they are treasured! Because of increasing spam, I have reluctantly eliminated "Anonymous" commenting. Legitimate anonymous commenters, please forgive me! You might try using "Open ID" instead. Blogger's spam software worked for a good long time, but, sadly, no longer.