and as it turns out our haunted house kicked some serious ass. A great cast, some crazy masks and a lot of plastic from Home Depot made quite a stir in our little corner of the Village.
Keith and I started setting stuff up around 11am. Of course I took the day off, because if I have the choice between making some cash or scaring some kids it's pretty clear what the better choice is. We got most of the plastic stapled to the ceiling - we created a little path from the front door all the way through the kitchen and out the back door. With some orange lights in the living room and some not so great black lights in the kitchen it looked pretty neat in the dark. RM and Judy came over around 2 and got to the cobwebs, which I thank them gratefully for, because that stuff is a real pain in the ass. RM and I busted out some Rosco-glo paint and I did the obligatory graveyard with ghosts and trees (classic WT) and RM did some eyes. It would have been cool if we had some good black lights, but for 1.25 what can you expect?
Long story short, there were 11 of us working our wonders at the house of horrors and we all found our comfortable zone just about the time it started winding down. Next year we'll have it goin' on.
These were the highlights:
*Keith looked remarkably like a Latin man in his clear plastic mask
*my chicken mask was much funnier than anticipated
*two little girls said "we like you, chicken lady" to me
*RM liked to mix it up a little and would greet guest with such brilliant phrases as "welcome to New Jersey!" or "Prepare to be mildly frightened"
* Alex knew exactly what shirt to pull from his closet as soon as I gave him his mask, the kids referred to him as "devil man"
*Judy could scream louder than any of the kids
*Loeb is really good at hissing
*only two mild injuries; Alex got punched in the face, I got a pitchfork to the eye
*the best "customer" was the little football player who fell down in fear and dropped all his candy, then couldn't decide whether to run or pick up his candy
Around 9pm we packed it in and had some beer and Chinese food.
All in all I would say that we succeeded in bringing a little of that down home white trash into our haunted house, so mission accomplished. And unlike the Bushies, I really mean it!