Category: halloween

The best holiday ever.

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the sheets and pillow are calling

Hey there Tuesday people.

I’m off again today, taking the corporate sawmill shuttle across the state a ways to work over there for a couple days.  More of the “meet and greet” business, with a little effort thrown in to justify the whole thing.  So, an evening in a hotel and two days away from the fam… could be worse I suppose.

I’m just dreading the 4:45am rise-and-shine… which means I better get to typing here – I got music and Halloween for you today, not much to write home about.

Lately, I’ve been on this soul music tear – acquiring (through absolutely unquestionably legal channels) tons and tons of vintage 60s and 70s soul records to try and flesh out my collection. In the process, I’ve found some simply amazing stuff – the cream of which so far has got to be material by one O.V. Wright. Someone I’d never even heard of before, it’s hard to believe this guy isn’t held in the same esteem as classic performers like Otis Redding and Marvin Gaye. His voice is incredible, full of emotion, and his songwriting isn’t so serious that you can’t get a chuckle here and there. And the music, oh man the music. All the right horns and cymbal crashes in all the right places… this stuff makes you feel.

Anyway, it’s just the tip of the iceberg. Some seventy albums into my bender, I realized I’ve now got too much to appreciate before something new comes along – and I’d better come up for air and actually take in some of what I’ve grabbed. Soul is a relatively new area for me, so I’m excited to get educated. I know, you’re riveted right no.  I’ll continue to thrill you with the following, I’m sure…

I was thrilled today as I came up with a really neat concept to “soup up” the Halloween prop setup. Right now I’ve got live power (at 120V AC) running all around the place to power the props. I’ve long worried about this being unsafe, as a lot of my connections are simple wire-nut jobs and could conceivably be susceptible to shorts (and, less plausible but still a concern, human contact). Today I hit upon a way to move most of the dangerous high-voltage hookups under the safety of the front porch roof enclosure – and wire the props in the yard with low-voltage 12V power.

Additionally, I dreamed up a way to reduce the amount of clutter I have by triggering the coffin “popper” and ceiling “dropper” from the same motion sensor. I know it doesn’t sound like much, but to me it means a lot less wiring, a lot cleaner interface between the props, and some cool new features. For instance, both the dropper and the popper can have (timed) associated sounds and targeted lighting now, in addition to the always-on “ambient” soundtrack that was there last year.

What’s more, if everything goes right – in addition to springing down on you from its hiding place above with a blood-curdling scream and scary spotlighting, the ceiling dropper will now spray a burst of fog towards you as well. It’s probably hard to visualize, so I’ll just post a video when I get it working.

Ahem… I’m outta here.  With such an early start to tomorrow, the sheets and pillow are calling.

Before I go, I keep meaning to mention that Ben posted his pictures from our abbreviated John Muir Trail hike over at his site.  Check them out here.

Goodnight.

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the halloween workshop

It’s nearing 2pm on this fine windows-open Sunday afternoon.

I just put Keaton down for a nap and Sharaun’s away at a baby shower.  I put on the new Of Montreal album (which is seriously growing on me, despite my initial skittishness) and decided to write a bit.  Now, writing wasn’t really my intention (nor has it been for the past week, as you’ve likely noticed if you’re a regular visitor here) – but I had no choice.

See, I had intended to get all the Halloween props down and start doing an assessment of what all needs to be repaired and what materials I’ll need to get everything back to working order.  But, all the Halloween gear is inside the fake coffin I built so many years ago to hold the pnuematic pop-up coffin dude, and that montrously heavy contraption is tied to the exposed rafters in my garage for storage (serisouly, where else am I going to store a full-size coffin?).  Problem is, other than my sneaking fear that the thing is gonna come crashing down randomly one day and wreck a car parked under it or worse smoosh someone as it falls, I can’t get the thing down all by my lonesome.  It’s just too heavy and unwieldy.  So, as Halloween prep goes, this morning was a complete loss.

Later in the day though, Sharaun got home and helped me lower the thing from it’s hold up in the rafters.  After that, I was able to get all the gear down from the various places it’s stuffed up into our roof and take a full account of things.  And, surprisingly, I’m not as concerned about the work as I was before.  Yeah, the rubber masks have all rotted and are tearing – those’ll have to be replaced, and I already knew I had to rebiuld the ghost… but everything else is just improvements: rewiring things for low-voltage operation in the name of safety, making cosmetic improvements, improving triggering and timing for the more complex animated props, etc.  I know you care dearly about all of this, so I’ll leave it at that level of detail and be done with it.  But, I’m happy to say that my side of the garage has now been officially transformed into the Halloween workshop; ’tis the season.

Shifting gears then…

Today as I walked in to pick Keaton up from her Sunday School class at church, her teacher turned to me and said, “Keaton had a day today.”  “Uh oh,” I said, recalling how we’d already struggled with her ourselves from the start as well.  “Yeah,” she continued, “I’ve never seen her like this.  Not only did she have four kicking and screaming on the ground fits, but she bullied every single kid in the class!” “Oh boy,” I sighed, looking down at our little angel sitting forlornly on a chair in all her infinite cuteness.  As Sharaun slid in beside me her teacher went on, “She pushed Madeline and pinched Matthew and just wouldn’t listen.”  Sharaun, having borne the brunt of Keaton’s earlier “No!” and hitting fit, screwed up her face and sternly asked Keaton to apologize, which she did.

Of course, after church she was a perfect little girl for me when Sharaun was away.  I sometimes think she acts out more for Sharaun than she does me, maybe because she’s got more to prove to her since she’s with her all day long or whatever.  Y’know, asserting her authority most to the one who’s the authority for most of the day, or something.  It sometimes makes me feel bad, because there are instances where she flips like a switch and instantly behaves better for me if Sharaun’s removed from the situation… but then again I also figure this is just the beginning of her wrapping me around her little finger so she can exploit me later in life.  Nah… I’m just playin’.  But I dunno y’allz… this girl can flex some bad, straight-up bad.

OK, whatever.  Goodnight.

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I ain’t about hard

Hi!  What up?  Shut up.  I don’t care.  Nah, I’m just kidding… what’s going down?  Nothing?  Yeah… me neither.

It’s Monday though, and it was an uncharacteristically Fallish day for California.  Just when it should be one-hundred degrees plus it cools down and even gets chilly at night.  I loved it, although when I woke up and felt the lingering chill of night it made me feel like I’m behind on designing this year’s Halloween props.  Well, more accurately fixing all the props that broke two years ago… which was a couple of the major ones.  I guess the cooler weather makes my brain think Fall, and Fall means it’s time to get working on Halloween.

Each year I build one new prop, and I usually allow myself one “large” purchase along with it.  One year it was a massive fog machine, the kind clubs use.  One year I bought a nice drill to aide in construction, another year a jigsaw.  One year a twenty gallon air compressor.   This year, I’m not sure.  I know I need to rebuild the flying crank ghost, because she literally wound herself to death last year, and I need to make some adjustments to the ceiling dropper too (which, despite never getting a full teaser video, actually came out pretty well in the end).  So, I think I’m gonna start working on those soon.  The crank ghost rebuild could take time, depending on whether or not I choose to do an “industrial strength” one or go with the cheapie I built last time (which looked great, but ultimately only lasted four seasons).  I’m thinking this time I do it right with angle-iron and a heavier-duty motor.

Thinking about it, I don’t think the changes to this year’s props will actually demand that much time… maybe a couple weeks to get things right.  The most difficult part will be fixing the ceiling dropper’s triggering mechanism and audio synchronization issues.  If I figure I can do that with relative ease, then I may actually have enough time to engineer a totally new item.  And, I’ve had an idea in my head now for over a year that I’d love to make happen: A glowing half-corpse/ghost that travels in a large loop in the air around our yard, as if floating along.  I imagine a torso and head, with a ragged end at the midsection and outstretched arms, flying around the yard overhead.  I know, a lofty concept.  But, I’ve sketched it out several times and think it can be done with just one drive motor and two or three clever pulley stanchions.  We’ll see…

Anyway, enough about Halloween, eh?  I just get excited… it’s been my favorite holiday ever since I was a little kid and all.  Let’s move on.

Today at work was busy.  In fact, work’s been getting busier all the time lately – a change from the few months of relative “down” time I had.  My program is sputtering along at half-choke, throttling up towards 100% which should happen sometime in January.  Then it’s balls-out for a good two years again before the cycle begins anew.  Things at the sawmill go like that, where a project lasts about three years or so, and then resets.  I’ve been through five now, some in parallel, obviously, and I feel like I’m getting better every time around.  I guess I’ve made up my mind that I’m gonna stick around this job.  I like it enough, I’m good enough at it, and it pays well… so, why leave?  It all fits nicely into my “why change?” style.  Change is hard y’all, and I ain’t about hard (well, most of the time, anyway).

Before I go, I wanted to tip my bloggers hat to a longtime friend of mine who’s recently started writing online.  I read, with tears poised in puddles just inside my eyelids, glistening in little shivering lumps of surface tension, waiting for one small motion to send them streaming, the first two parts (one here, two here) of her multi-part entry, “I Killed My Parents.”  All the years I’ve known you, Sheila, and I’ve never asked you about your folks.  I’m not that guy, the one who asks, even if you set me up for the question… I’ll likely balk until you’re ready to tell me outright.  I’m glad I finally know the story, thanks for telling me (and everyone else).  Can’t wait to read the rest.  And, oh yeah, we love you.

So, that a sappy enough ending for ya?  Hope so, ’cause I’m outta stuff to write.  I think it’s a respectable entry, no?  Yeah, let’s call it a wrap.

Oh hey wait, look, Megan used Keaton as the subject of a Photoshop tutorial.  That’s an interesting kind of exposure, eh?  And, maybe it’ll get you “we want new pictures!” hounds off my back for a few hours.  (I swear they’re coming, for reals… soon even.)

Goodnight friends.  Until tomorrow.

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maybe get sick on candy


Happy Halloween friends and enemies! Let not your modern-day Protestant church rob you of the good times this holiday affords the world! Forsake that “Harvest Festival” or “Fall Celebration” for some good old trick-or-treating with a scary mask and some fake blood! Maybe get sick on candy like you were a kid again. If not tonight, when else?

Tonight (which is last night as you read this, should you know nothing about when/how I blog) Keaton sat on my lap and watched It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown with me (on DVD, of course, since it’s such a classic). To my surprise, she sat right down with me and truly paid attention. I think it’s because she’s able to recognize so many things: pumpkins, ghosts, the moon, a football, a dog, hats, trees, leaves, and mail – just to name a few. Her sense of recognition and memory impresses me on a daily basis, and her vocabulary, word usage, and phrase-building ability boggles my mind. She says things like “Keeper, out, room!” to the cat; “Daddy, reading, book,” to me; “Mommy, cooking, dinner, hungry, eat,” all together like she’s really trying to make a coherent thought. I know it’s like just the beginning of her “grouping” the words she knows around a single binding action or concept, but it’s still pretty amazing. Pretty much every day she says a word I hadn’t even thought she’d known… it’s pretty impressive.

I went to lunch with a fellow manager from work today, and even though I don’t start back there until Monday, I couldn’t help but use our time to begin gearing my mind for the return. I asked about the usual: what’s going on, how’s morale, how are the politics, who’s doing what, what’s coming up, what happened while I was out, and what of the latest rumors and soap opera goings-on. It was a good conversation, but, in the end, it more than reinforced my dream of winning the lottery Saturday night so I just don’t have to go in at all. I’ve waffled here before about my job – which I truly do enjoy, and feel I’m good at – but also on the other hand wouldn’t mind seeing being swallowed up whole by the Earth in some freak geological event. It’s a fine balance, a knife-edge thing of sorts. I fear, however, that I will be going back… that much, at least, is rather inevitable. And, if I’m to go back and continue to do well – I figured I better start those long-rested hamsters a’running again before I walk in on day-one. Sigh… it begins.

Tonight I watched most (not all, I’ll admit, as it began wearing on me) of the Democratic debate on MSNBC. Ugh… people… we’ve got another whole year of this. I don’t know that I can take it. I’m a fairly well-established social liberal, so I like to think I identify with the general current of thought of these people, their platforms. But man, I’m already weary. Anyone else share in my apathy? I hate how politics can just suck the life of out seemingly everything sometimes. Why, when I watch these people, do I take on such an air of doubt… why do I find it so hard to assume they are being honest? What have you done to me, George W. Bush? You’ve ruined me. You’re such a fucker. You’re a fucker and you’ve made me ashamed of my country’s truckballs-style John Wayne politics on the world stage. Ugh… another year.

Finally, before I go, a snippet from a recent interview with Trent Reznor (Nine Inch Nails frontman and a proponent of various forms of the “new thought” regarding music distribution), where he admits he was an OiNKer (see my earlier entry if the word “OiNKer” means nothing to you), and talks a bit about the former site:

What do you think about OiNK being shut down?

Trent: I’ll admit I had an account there and frequented it quite often. At the end of the day, what made OiNK a great place was that it was like the world’s greatest record store. Pretty much anything you could ever imagine, it was there, and it was there in the format you wanted. If OiNK cost anything, I would certainly have paid, but there isn’t the equivalent of that in the retail space right now. iTunes kind of feels like Sam Goody to me. I don’t feel cool when I go there. I’m tired of seeing John Mayer’s face pop up. I feel like I’m being hustled when I visit there, and I don’t think their product is that great. DRM, low bit rate, etc. Amazon has potential, but none of them get around the issue of pre-release leaks. And that’s what’s such a difficult puzzle at the moment. If your favorite band in the world has a leaked record out, do you listen to it or do you not listen to it? People on those boards, they’re grateful for the person that uploaded it — they’re the hero. They’re not stealing it because they’re going to make money off of it; they’re stealing it because they love the band. I’m not saying that I think OiNK is morally correct, but I do know that it existed because it filled a void of what people want.

Man, that sure sounds like it was a cool website… too bad I never got the chance to check it out. In summary: I was never a member. But, if there was some some bizarro world in which I was – I most certainly would’ve only reveled in the site’s groundbreaking role in digital content distribution, and never partook in it’s tainted wares. I’m to straight and narrow to put my neck out there like that… don’t y’all know me at all?

Goodnight.

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Master Lieabout von Housebound, Esq.


A few times today and once last night I heard thunder; even saw lightning. I enjoy hearing it; it reminds me of the rainstorms we’d get most summer afternoons back in Florida. Back now from Hawaii, I settled right back into my pre-trip alter-ego, Master Lieabout von Housebound, Esq.. Today was spent reading, listening to music, wrestling with Keaton, and monitoring a few choice IRC channels. I know, I know… you (nor I) haven’t used IRC since, like, highschool, or something… but I have decent reasons (all legit and legally kosher, mind you). Anyway, Sharaun’s at the gym now and Keaton and I are dancing around to In Rainbows (I didn’t get to jam to it much in Hawaii and was getting the shakes). We like our alone-time, it’s good for our relationship and stuff.

If you’ll cast your memories back with me for a moment, you’ll perhaps recall that, before leaving for a week in the Pacific Islands, I had torn down my summer tomatoes and sown in a goodly sized crop of “winter” wheat – all part of some idea I got in my head about wanting to “understand” the real “cost” of a piece of bread. While I was away, modern suburban scheduled irrigation dutifully watered my crop for me – and, while drinking coconut-infused cocktails astride the pool in Maui, I often wondered if there’d be any noticeable growth upon my return. I hoped for growth, of course, results from untended efforts are some of my absolute favorite results, but I was careful not to get my hopes up. When we had finally pulled into the driveway, fetched the luggage and baby, and were walking towards the front door, however, I made sure to get on my tippytoes for a second so I could peer over that little dip in our fence where the gardenbox is visible. I was ecstatic the view greeting me home:

Not bad. Now we’ll see if it’ll make it to seed.

Moving on, I feel I would be remiss were I not to note the fact that today is All Hallows Eve Eve. If you’ve been following my blog here at sounds familiar for any length of time, you know I’m an absolute nut for Halloween – have been since I was a kid. Every year since we bought our house, I’ve constructed and displayed elaborate props for the occasion, and we’ve thrown an annual bash for the past four years. Originally I figured, with Halloween falling during my sabbatical this year, that I’d have even more time to repair the brokenness of last year and maybe even make some super fantastic new props. But, the way things landed: our week in Hawaii right up against my favorite of all holidays, the run-down state of the existing props, and me being worried about repeat thievery with a yardful of props and no one home – I just decided to blow the whole thing off. It sucks, and I’ve had three neighbors ask me what’s up… but I vow to be back next year with a vengeance. It just doesn’t feel like Halloween without all the preparation and work, I’m a beaten man.

Goodnight.

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stick with me


Tuesday, and my last day of vacation. Well, last day for another three days, at least. Then I’m off another entire week. I return to work on the 23rd, and that leaves me with just five weeks of work left before my two-month “sabbatical.” I am truly excited about this, nearly to the point of advanced mental checkout. Knowing that you only have a month or so left at the sawmill can make a person’s mind really start to wander. I know it’s gonna come up fast, I can already tell. Anyway, last night we went to dinner with the family and some friends, then stole and enjoyed a cam copy of the Cusack new horror flick, 1408. Was a low-key evening and a nice way to spend our last real night together with Sharaun’s folks. Let’s try to write a lil’ bit now, shall we?

Can’t hardly believe it’s July in 2007 already. That’s more than the halfway mark (don’t think I don’t know this means I missed my yearly “half-best” list). The fact that we’re already on the waning side of the ’07 also means that my mind starts turning towards Halloween. Last year, almost every single one of my complicated props broke in some major way. Punks tried to steal my coffin-popper, the flying crank ghost got tangled up in her own puppetstrings and ended up a twisted heap, the ceiling dropper shook himself loose to some degree, and the witch’s rags are looking a bit too… raggedy. (Not to mention I got penis’d.) After last year’s soirée, I had all but decided that it would be the last of it – that I was done. Now, however, coming up on August (usually the first month I start thinking about props)… I’m not so sure. Guess I’ll just see how it goes.

I’m off to Oregon in the early ‘morn tomorrow, driving there in the dark as the flight leaves with the sun. I’ll spend a couple quick days at work there, and an even quicker night at my folks’ place between the two. So, once again, posting may be light for the next week or so – which is kinda nice for me, but perhaps not so good for maintaining readership. Guess that’s the way blogging goes.

Until sometime later, stick with me.

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rainy weather prelude


Monday and it was back to work for me…

These two-ish weeks between Thanksgiving vacation and Christmas vacation are always a bear. A difficult-to-concentrate time bookended by memories of, and lookings-forward to, days spent away from work. In highschool, I recall our guidance counselor counseling against letting “senioritis” creep in during those last months, weeks, and days prior to gradation. And while my near two-week Christmas vacation is hardly as big a respite from the millstone as graduation seemed to be at the time, it sure possesses some of the same Siren-song draw. I sit at work and think about hanging out with friends and family in the uniquely temperate weather of a December in Florida… it’s an affliction.

Sunny California is currently busy making a mockery of its state motto, tossing up a knobby middle finger of cold and rain. Honestly though, I like the winter weather, and am glad for it.

Note: Somehow, this afternoon when I wrote that initial sentence, I had intended it as a segue into the rest of this paragraph where I talk about the fact that I haven’t yet put away all the Halloween decorations. Now, however, having written the intro sentence a few hours ago and coming back now to finish, I have no idea how a prelude about rainy winter weather was supposed to lead to that topic. So, without attempting some fancy link between the two, I’ll go right into the Halloween topic now.

I still haven’t put away all the Halloween decorations. Chiefly among them, the 100lbs+ coffin is still sitting in the garage, impeding our way in and out of the house and forcing me to ease the truck in ever so delicately to avoid crushing it’s presswood walls by pulling in too far. Seeing that thing there every day, still unstored for next season, and remembering back to how much trouble this year’s decorations were – I’m beginning to dread the annual Halloween setup, ending up in the same kind of love/hate relationship I have with Christmas decorations. If I don’t get that coffin lashed up to the rafters soon, I’m going to end up hating it so much that I won’t want to bother repairing and reusing everything for next year.

Read this article with a bit of cautious interest today, hoping my decision doesn’t make my vision all milky someday down the road…

Goodnight.