I dislike Hallowe'en.  There, I've said it.  Fill my in-box with disagreement; comment at will, but I do.  It's completely out of hand in the USA, and I blame the baby boomers.  Are y'all SO desperate to rewrite your childhoods that you've created this (pun intended) monster of a "holiday"?  Stop it!

When I was growing up (or attempting to; there are those who'd say I haven't accomplished it yet), October 31 was relatively simple.  Costume, jack-o-lantern, candy, Charlie Brown.  That was IT.  Oh, and we Catholic kids got the next day off.  Nyah-nyah-neener-neener.  (Of course, the Protestant kids said the same to us every OTHER day as they walked half a block to school and we took a half-hour bus ride.  Oh well.)

I was recently invited (via a catalog) to purchase a "Halloween Tree".  This is a dead tree thingy (I was going to type "faux dead tree", but then that would imply it's alive, when in truth it is some sort of plastic) which I would then be required to decorate with strings of pumpkin lights, dangling bats, and "cobwebs", also faux.  Interestingly, this same decor graced (sic) a formerly very nice restaurant I visited this past week.  Call me the late-October equivalent of December's Ebenezer, but $30 entrees and plastic spiders do NOT harmonize.

Take a look at this:

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=4933776

(If, like me, you never click on links because you can't be bothered, I'll describe it.  It's a six-FOOT inflatable snow-globe-type thingy from Wal-Mart, meant as a Hallowe'en decoration.  It has bats flying around in it *yes, faux bats* and a giant glowing skull and what-not.  *I bet you're wishing you had just clicked the link, aren't you?* It's on sale for about $50, reduced from just over $70.  I didn't buy one, so they have some left.)

It's almost a little too easy to trash on Wal-Mart, so I must rush to add that these things or their approximations are everywhere.  Giant glowing heads in "crystal" balls also seem popular this festive season.  Now, I'll drop more than a few dollars on shoes or a bag in a heartbeat, but the price of all this nonsensery just blows me away.  Wal-Mart says the item above is "imported or of US manufacture"....hah.  What are the people in China or Malaysia or wherever THINKING of us as they assemble this hideousness?  The only thing I can imagine is...."People with more money than sense".

You're best advised not to knock on my door this year...I've got organic granola bars, sugar-free juice boxes, and, it seems, a major attitude.