Can you be a Scrooge at Halloween?

I really wanted to get in the Halloween spirit this year.

Several weeks ago I covered my front door with black fabric and attached a Scream mask to it. Elegant and scary at the same time, I thought. And yesterday I went to Wal-Mart and spent about $20 on candy. Not an outrageous amount, but it filled up a mongo bowl pretty well. So I was set.

I left the front door closed because my bug guy says huge roaches come in when you leave it open. Even on Halloween, I don't want big roaches. I expected that the trick-or-treaters would see the scary door and the porch light, and assume I was open for business. They did. Unfortunately.

The first set was two boys about 13 years old - really too old to be trick or treating. They rang the bell. I was in the kitchen. Before I reached the door, they rang the bell again AND knocked. My house is not that big - say, 10 steps from where I was to the door? I don't know that I would have had time to open the door before the second ring if I'd had my hand on the knob when it rang the first time! I gave them candy, probably 10 or so pieces each.

Then my nieces came by. That was the best part. No complaints.

I went back in and started back in the kitchen. The door bell rang. I came to the door. Three ghoulies this time - two kids, 10 or under, cute with pumpkin buckets. Nice. I gave them candy - probably, again, about 10 pieces each, about 4-5 mini-candybars in the handful. As much as I could get in one handful. The third was probably 16 or older, the older brother bringing around the kids. Nice of him, but he also had a Wal-Mart bag open for me to give him his share. Sheesh. So I did. Same amount, as much as I could get in my hand at one time.

As he walked away, he said, "You're going to have a lot of candy left."

And Happy Halloween to you too!

I remember Halloween as a very happy, exciting fun time. We lived in the country so there weren't that many houses to go to, and back then we were as likely to get an apple or a homemade dried apple hand pie as we were a candybar. It was all good! We still had enough candy to make ourselves sick for a week. And we always said thank you. Then when we were 12, it was all over - no more trick-or-treating.

So what's with this older kids thing, no adults in sight, behaving impolitely and making snide comments about how much candy they got? Why do I feel like Scrooge when it's only Halloween??

It makes a body wish she was a real monster. Then we'd see a little tricking. Heh.