tricks and treat

It was still dark when we drove to church this morning. The odd feeling continued when the bells at All Saints Church didn't chime at the start of the 8:15 Mass. They did ring at 9:15 however. The computer that controls them must have thought that Daylight Saving Time ended last night. In previous years, the last weekend in October is when we experienced "The 25th Hour." This year the time change doesn't come until after Halloween, which should mean more daylight for the trick-or-treaters. While they were changing things, why couldn't they have moved the switch to an early Saturday morning?

Was I hallucinating or did I really see a few minutes of "Mannheim Steamroller's Halloween on Ice" yesterday on NBC? It looked like Nancy Kerrigan skating with Frankenstein's monster and several others. Like a good ghost story, this one turned out to be true.

Before I turned off the TV, I saw the answer to a Mannheim Steamroller trivia question. Did you know that Chip Davis co-created the character of C.W. McCall, best known for the song "Convoy"?

Halloween must be the first of the holidays that Weigel's is celebrating with the annual arrival of their Holiday Egg Nog. This year, the sweet treat showed up in the dairy case of my neighborhood Weigel's on Friday, October 26. It wouldn't bother me one bit if they carried it year round, like at the Wawa store I visited near Richmond.

good times

The last weekend in October was always one of my favorite weekends of the year. As I mentioned last year, my friend Bean and I put together a one hour recorded show to fill the extra time on the WAVA music log when the clocks got turned back. It aired every year from 1985 to 1991 and I would try to stay up to hear it.

When we lived in Burbank, my wife and I got involved with staging a haunted house fundraiser at St. Finbar School. One year, I had one of the parent volunteers to dress as a TV news reporter. At the entrance, we showed a videotape with the basic safety announcements disguised as a news report about a killer on the loose. Once the customers got inside, they saw the killer and his victim, the TV reporter. Our friends Charlie and Anja were in charge of the haunted house and always threw a great "wrap party" at their home. Charlie is a comedy writer and always made sure the experience was as funny as it was scary. Even after the school discontinued the haunted house, Charlie and Anja continued hosting the parties and Charlie would dress as a recently deceased celebrity.

Next year the time change moves to after Halloween. The move to November is fine by me but I still think the clocks should be changed on a Friday night/Saturday morning, especially in the Spring. Any takers?