As we all know, the season of ghosts and goblins is upon us. For many of us (and by that I mean me) the season is filled with horrors that are unimaginable – and I’m not just talking about leftover candy. Mainly because in my house, there’s no such thing as leftover candy.
No, I’m talking about avoiding the tricks of trick-or-treating. Trust me. Halloween is a very spooky holiday and you have to know the rules to survive. And by survive I mean make it to Nov. 1 without having egg on your garage door.
The first rule of Halloween survival is if you are home, answer the door and give out candy. Look, I know that after a hard day at work, the last thing you want to do is lock your barking dog in the bathroom and answer the door for three hours while giving out the equivalent of a week’s pay in miniature packs of Starburst to ghosts and goblins. And I know that you believe the solution is to just turn out all the lights and sit in the dark for three hours while you eat all the Starbursts.
This will not work.
You see, the little ghosts and goblins that are wandering your neighborhood are being trailed by parents who have also had a hard day at work. And when the small ghosts and goblins see that your lights are out, they will insist upon making sure that you are not home. This is because no child can actually fathom that someone would rather sit home in the dark eating Starbursts instead of answering the door 152 times and giving all the goodies to someone else.
And the parent who is trailing behind the ghost or goblin will have given up utterly on saying “no” and will then allow said ghost or goblin to verify that you are, indeed, not at home. And therefore that ghost or goblin will walk right up to your door and ring your doorbell approximately 152 times or until you give up and answer it, whichever occurs first.
Trust me. Just answer the door, give up the Starbursts and nobody will get hurt.
Now, if you are really, truly not going to be home, you must obey the second rule of Halloween survival: do not under any circumstances leave a bowl of candy on the porch with a sign that says, “Only take one!” Seriously, nobody – and I mean nobody – obeys signs like that.
Look, there is an entire bowl of chocolate sitting there and you expect that a sign is going to make people only take one? You are crazy. It’s like thinking you will survive a zombie apocalypse by leaving a sign on your porch that says, “My brains are too stupid to eat. Try next door, that lady has a Ph.D.”
Also? One word for you: Teenagers. They don’t read signs and can empty that bowl into a pillowcase in two seconds. The next day at school they will use that candy as currency so they can get all the answers for their trig homework, thus ensuring that their SAT scores are crap because they didn’t learn that one trig lesson. In any event, the first few teens will empty that bowl. And the rest of them will egg your garage door because they have walked the long, long path to your porch only to find the bowl is empty except for a sign that nobody has read.
Of course, sometimes the unthinkable happens. Sometimes, no matter how prepared you are, you can have a huge rush of trick-or-treaters and realize that by 6:15 p.m., you are completely out of candy. And when you stand out on the porch, looking out over the neighborhood, you can see a huge glob of children heading to your house.
Do not panic. Simply follow the third rule of Halloween survival. Grab your child’s full pillowcase and give all their candy to the hungry horde of witches and warlocks at your door.
Hey, it’s survival of the fittest when it comes to Halloween.
