Tomorrow is Halloween, my least favorite holiday of the year. Yes, I’m a Halloween Grinch. Now, I don’t want to start a theological debate or hear the REAL history of Halloween, I just want to complain about what I think is the stupidest holiday since Columbus Day. I mean, what other holiday can I look forward to having six crazed kids dragging me around the neighborhood on their quest for sugar. Yippee! So, here are the top 5 reasons I hate Halloween.
It’s the Devil’s Holiday
OK, maybe it is, maybe it isn’t. I guess it all depends on your personal beliefs, but any holiday that you celebrate by hopping up your children on sugar has to have its roots in the devil. Also, why this fascination with death and fear and ghouls etc. Why would anyone want to be a Zombie, even for just a few hours??? I can’t think of a single perk to being an undead guy with body parts falling off! And what’s with the Halloween yard decorations??? I don’t understand the appeal of covering your lawn with fake tombstones. It’s really just so so weird.
Pumpkins
Curse you HEB! Why did you have to put out your pumpkins out in September? Every time we go shopping my kids ask me “are we going to get a pumpkin today?” Walking by those pumpkins is like checking your calendar and noticing that you have a root canal appointment on the 31st. Eventually the day will arrive when you actually have to live through what you have been dreading.
And I am not exaggerating one bit! It is 7:47 in the morning, I’m trying to write this post, and my son is sitting next to me nagging me because he wants me to carve the pumpkin that I finally broke down and bought…….NOW!
Once you agree to carve the pumpkin you will be confronted with that disgusting pumpkin slime. It literally gives me chills just thinking about it! Is there any other holiday that involves anything as gross as scraping out the inside of a pumpkin. Every year my adorable wife suggests that we roast the pumpkin seeds, which will yield about a tablespoon of actual food from my 2 hours of effort and won’t taste as good as the bag you can buy at HEB! Good thing she is adorable.
On top of all this, I hate pumpkin spice, hate pumpkin pie, hate pumpkin muffins, hate pumpkin lattes. Is it Thanksgiving yet?
Costumes
Do you wanna know when my kids started harassing me about costumes? The same day HEB put their pumpkins on display, in early September. Do you know how many times one of my kids asked me “can we go over and look at the costumes?” A bazillion. Do you want to know how many times my kids changed their minds on what they wanted to dress up as? Yep, you guessed it, a bazillion.
You might think that my adorable wife could whip together some costumes, since she is sort of artsy, but no, she has all sorts of silly excuses why she can’t do it (a full time job, 6 kids, a husband who won’t stop complaining about Halloween). So this year she found some onesie pajamas on sale and convinced the kids that they would be just as good as a “real” costumes, and they could wear them all winter long. So if you see my kids on Halloween night, please don’t make some joke about how they look like they are wearing pajamas. It could seriously scar them!
Trick or Treating
Exactly why do I have to drag (or rather be dragged by) my children door to door so some stranger can dump a handful of sugar into their bag? For 364 days it is not all right for some stranger to offer my kids candy and then one night we make it the central focus of a holiday. For example, if it’s June 15th and I put a sign out in my front yard saying ” Hey Little Children, come get your candy”, I’m pretty sure the neighborhood would come over to my house with shovels and pitchforks. Very confusing.
It is also supposed to rain on Halloween at our house, just like it did last year. So in the name of holiday spirit, we will be tromping around in the rain, not dressed appropriately for the weather, to collect candy that we don’t even like (please people, no Mounds or Almond Joy)!
Candy
I have a love/hate relationship with candy. I love it when I get to eat it and hate it when my kids are fighting and squabbling over their sugar stash. Since I no longer get to eat candy, I’m not so excited about having a house full of it.
I also hate how Halloween candy comes in single serving sizes which result in thousands of candy wrappers littering my house. Because no matter how many times I ask my kids to throw away their wrappers, I find them everywhere but the trash can!!!
In closing, I just want to say that I do love almost any other holiday of the year. Thanksgiving makes me feel all warm and fuzzy. Christmas is magical. Even St. Patrick’s Day includes Guinness. But as for Halloween, it’s about as much fun as a time change. Oh yeah, that’s happening this week, too! Boooooooo! Don’t forget to set your clocks back on Saturday night!
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Happy Halloween!
Oh, my! Halloween is FUN! I like Mounds and Almond Joy candy bars! When we lived on base, Chris would dress up like a scarecrow with a real pumpkin head that I carved from the bottom. He would sit quietly with the bowl of candy. If the kid wasn’t little, Chris would reach out to grab the bowl as they were getting their candy, which certainly surprised them! It was great fun. Kids would bring their friends. We had almost every kid from the base and half from town come to our house. Now we live at the end of… Read more »
Ha perfect Diane! You need to have Chris come scare some fun into Brian. He’s just mad because he can’t think of a cool costume.
I fully agree with you on this Halloween hogwash! I think we should cancel Halloween!
Bah humbug! My four kids are just about grown (one left at home) and we love carving pumpkins! I’m the cleaner-outer person because I can clean out a bunch of pumpkins and roast the seeds in no time! Regarding candy, this is just the FIRST of many candy holidays that dont end until Easter! THAT part I’m not particularly fond of. But I do love Halloween! Did I mention I have two gargantuan spiders for decorations? Oh my are they fun! Happy Halloween!
Bah Humbug