Welcome to Mischief Night

Happy night before Halloween or All Hallows' Eve otherwise known as Mischief Night.  Back when my mom was a kid (or heck go back to when my grandfather was a kid), this was the night that the kids would play tricks on their neighbors. Stuff like throwing toilet paper in trees were some of the pranks that were pulled. 

Now, not so much and that's probably a good thing. However I have seen a recent trend of people talking about how different Halloween has become over the past few decades or so. In some places, kids no longer trick or treat at all. They instead go to the local mall, a school, or a trunk or treat event (when I was a kid if these were options we'd just do as many as we could in addition to traditional trick or treating).

I'll be honest I was one of those kids who dressed up and went trick or treating until I was about 16 years old (I also looked like I was about 12) and it was always a blast. We'd walk around the neighborhood in group of 5 or 6 kids with an adult not that far behind us. Sometimes people would have amazing decorations up that we'd run through giggling. Other times a neighbor would be hidden near the candy bowl and move to scare us when we least suspected it.

We knew we were never in any real danger, especially with  our parents egging us on to ring the doorbell of the really scary houses. There was one year when I was 7 that I scared a neighbor's kids so badly that they refused to go trick or treating. I was dressed as a vampire and had fake blood dripping down my chin.

Halloween as a kid was the best!

As an adult Halloween can be fun, but it depends on what to do. I've always been excited to pass out candy to trick or treaters, except in all the areas that I lived, there weren't any. Most kids went trick or treating at the above mentioned approved places. I might get some this year, but I don't know for certain.

As an adult, I have the option of going to haunted houses, going out and partying, staying in and watching scary movies, or all three. I've spent most of the season going through my Halloween movie collection.

Haunted Houses are another aspect of Halloween that I think has changed a lot. I remember the first year that Buschgardens hosted Hallowscream. It was really cool, if very crowded. Now every theme park seems to have Halloween attractions at night during October. Then there are the haunted houses, hay rides, and corn mazes that crop up only for this time of year. They can range from the sort of cheesy to the OMG I can't believe I signed a waiver to do this.

I actually don't like haunted houses. I'm not that big of a fan of gory horror movies either, but the campy ones with Vincent Price are always worth a viewing. As much as I like the decorations and atmosphere at Halloween, I'm not into getting the stuffing scared out of me by a guy wielding a chainsaw. I'd rather be outside dressed up as a silly spook begging my neighbors for free candy.

But since it's not socially acceptable for me to go trick or treating anymore, I'm going to enjoy watching old horror movies on Hulu while Elvira gives her snarky commentary.

Stay safe everyone. Have a happy Halloween. And if you guys do celebrate Devil's/Mischief Night, try not to do any actual damage and clean up any small pranks.

Someone smashed the pumpkins :(

Until next week.

If you enjoyed this post (or it really pissed you off), please like, share, and/or leave a comment. I love hearing from my readers and I hope you guys like hearing from me.

Cue the evil laughter.