Happy Halloween

The weather guy told me that Halloween was probably going to be wet and miserable...again. I had to work last Halloween, but my wife told me that they only trick-or-treated down half of one street because it was so miserable. My six-year-old, who was dressed as a teen wolf-looking werewolf in jeans and a flannel shirt, had to quit because his pants had gotten so wet from the rain that they were giving him a rash scratching against his legs.

I was determined to give him a better Halloween this year. I took the day off so that we could trick-or-treat together. And then the weather guy told us that it was going to rain again this year. We just finished having the best weekend weather in a month, but a storm was coming in, and it was going to be a big one. Severe storm warnings for the whole area. I was super irritated. Shouldn't we only get rainy days on Halloween once every few years? That seems only fair.

All the weather people did say to get out early and get your trick-or-treating done as soon as possible, because it was going to get worse as the night wore on. So we did. At 5:30, we were out the door. It was already drizzling. We took the umbrella and tried to stay together underneath it.

We got to about six houses before the rain really set in.

But my six-year-old ninja wasn't interested in going home. I kept trying to convince him that we could go home and have some dinner, put his costume in the dryer for a while, and wait for a break in the rain to go back out again. When he said no, I was willing to keep going, because I truthfully expected that there might not be any break in the rain at all. If we went home, we might never go back out. I didn't want that, and neither did he.

But it kept raining, and getting worse. I stole these two frames out of a video I shot of us walking around. Look at how full the gutters are:

It was a mess. At last, he relented, and we went home as quick as we could for some dinner and a tumble dry low.

We were home for about fifteen minutes, still waiting for dinner to be ready, when the weather changed. The rain slowed, and then all but stopped. Afraid we'd miss our chance if we didn't go right away, we pulled his costume out of the dryer, grabbed the umbrella and headed back out. The funny thing was that for the next two hours, the weather was almost perfect. It barely sprinkled, and the temperature was completely pleasant. Those stinking weather people who said to get out and trick-or-treat early were totally wrong. If we'd only ignored their advice and waited, we could have had a completely dry Halloween, instead of a waterlogged mess.

Also, we could have waited a little longer and had some nice hot dinner. Since we ran out the door when we did, we didn't get any dinner until 8:00 when we finally called it a night. By then, the food wasn't nearly as good. It was Navajo tacos, which are great when the scones are warm, not so great later when even the chili is cold.

It was a trade off I was willing to make though, because me and the kid had a great time trick-or-treating. He got a super-full bag of candy, and a big smile out of it. Of course, after the candy rots out all of his teeth, his smile won't look nearly as good, but for now, we're happy.