Halloween is coming, Monkey Keys. It’s basically the last bastion we have before winter; it stands orange and defiant against insurmountable snow. Halloween is a great symbol for cold calling and childhood obesity world over. However, in the later years of its life, Halloween has been receiving a lot of fliegerabwehrkanone. Maybe that’s why it was no surprise to me the Irish had a hand in its creation.
The whole thing used to be called Samhain and was a celebration for the end of harvest. The ancient Celtic IRS would audit the food stores for the winter while everyone else put on masks to pretend they were dead. They believed this would fool the IRS into ignoring their undisclosed mutton. Sadly, it was still subject to estate tax.
Eventually some striking individuals decided to call the 31st All Hallows’ Eve as the evening prior to the similarly named All Hallows’ Day. This was abbreviated to Hallowe’en by the lazy before being abbreviated again to Halloween by the even lazier. Future Dylan informed me this will be abbreviated further to Hall’een and then Hleen respectively before ultimately being called H in accordance with the single letter proper noun standard of 2047.
Pope Gregory III blindsided H Day by moving the Christian holiday All Saints Day from May 18 to November 1 sometime around 834 AD. The attempt was to fully Christianize H since the burning mutton fires lit by the pagans lowered land value in Rome. However, the sudden name change confused the Celtics who had been at the pub. The result was a weird blend of attending mass and going door to door with masks on to collect “soul cakes.” The cakes were consumed until fatness set in so evil spirits would ignore the consumers. Evidently they were shallow evil spirits.
As is tradition in America, the Celtics brought H over on the boats to be completely screwed up. The cakes became candy to remove any hope of nutrition from the practice. All the religious malarkey was replaced with Spiderman costumes, and the sense of pride and honor in one’s family ancestry was replaced with blackmailing neighbors under threat of egg to feed children they didn’t know. The traditional ‘trick or treat’ question itself is actually a thinly veiled threat against the homeowner. A more descriptive phrase ‘prepare to have your homestead redecorated in rotting carcasses and fecal matter before ultimately being burned down or treat’ was ultimately rejected as it took too long to say and cut into candy time.
This was all fine and dandy for the free loving children of the 60s, but now they’re grown up and determined to stop future generations from ever having the fun they did. Alternatives to trick or treating have arisen in the form of lame parties and sit-ins. While this is a widespread practice, it is not widespread enough to remove trick or treating entirely.
Modern H is now celebrated by purchasing way too much overpriced candy. Said candy is dispensed in one of two ways. It can be physically handed to the three children and five teenage punks who come to your home over the course of three hours by referencing the following formula:
amount of candy per child measured in ‘fun sized’ bars (C)
number of children at door (D)
time passed in hours (T)
C = 1/D * T^4
The other option is placing said candy in a dish with a ‘take one’ sign to be taken via the following formula:
amount of candy per child measured in ‘fun sized’ bars (C)
number of children at door (D)
age of child in years (A)
total candy in bowl (T)
C = T * ((A/15) /D)
With any C greater than T meaning a break and enter by the child to collect C pieces of candy.
“So, Dylan, you must really hate Halloween.”
On the contrary, Pumpkin Key, I’m simply getting in the festive mood. It’s about time to be picking out those costumes. I might also suggest buying that pound and a half of candy now. As we get closer to H the price goes up:
Price per bag (P)
Day of the month (D)
P = D^3
“So what do you think you’re going to dress up as this year, Dylan?”
A failed economy.
“…so do they make a mask for that or what?”
