Halloween 2014

September 13

I'm sure I've done little things to my Halloween section more than once throughout the year, but I don't know what, and I didn't see fit to make note of it at the time(s), so whatevs. I just wanted to say that tonight I started a page I've been meaning to start for some time, Halloween memories. I may work more on it between now and Halloween, I don't know.

October 9

And again, I'm sure I must have done little things since my last update, which I probably don't remember now. Well, I started watching Supernatural: The Animation several days ago. I'd like to get through that whole series this month, if I can. And I'll probably be watching some vaguely Halloweenish things throughout the month, though mostly closer to and on Halloween itself. And today I have added the song "Make Out in the Graveyard" to my Halloween mp3 player. (It's from the movie Fun Size, which I watched last Halloween.) Oh yeah, and it must have been even before my first update this year that got some pumpkin spice flavor Hershey's kisses, which I still haven't finished. I'll probably have some left by Halloween. And a couple days ago I did some editing of my Halloween links page, including adding a link to a site recommended by someone who sent me an e-mail after having discovered my site. And... I hope I'm not forgetting to mention anything important.

October 10

Someone shared a YouTube video on facebook, with Halloween life hacks about making some cool decorations. It's from last year, but this is the first time I've seen it. Anyway, I added it to my AV page.

October 15

I watched a repeat of last year's Toy Story of Terror and the classic It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.

October 25

I put together a Halloween playlist on Spotify, which you can now find embedded on the AV page.

October 26

Watched a DVD of the 1978 Bugs Bunny's Howl-oween Special, which sucked. But the bonus feature was awesome, so... I don't feel like I wasted the money I paid for the DVD. (I think it was three or four dollars.)

October 27

Watched last week's new Halloween episode of Brooklyn Nine-Nine on Hulu. Just like last year's Halloween episode, it's only marginally about Halloween, but mostly about a bet between Jake and Holt. And it's awesome. Also, sometime after last Halloween, I started a Treehouse of Horror page. This year is the first time I wrote an entry for the new episode (Treehouse XXV). But I also put entries for the previous eleven episodes, since I had written a bit about them over the years in this journal. Of course, there are a bunch of even earlier Treehouse episodes that I need to rewatch someday. Anyway, tonight I watched "Gotham" and "Sleepy Hollow," though I didn't pay 100% attention to them, since I was working on the Treehouse page. But the former had a killer who could have been possessed by some kind of spirit, and the latter had a wendigo. So, vaguely Halloweeny, I guess.

Also, today is the start of Halloweek! Monday through Friday, there's special stuff to watch on Geek & Sundry's YouTube channel. If you look at the schedule on the first link I provided, you'll see just a few things each day, but if you look at the second link, the actual Halloweek playlist, there are a bunch of things that aren't listed on the schedule. I won't be watching everything (not even every thing listed on the schedule), but I watched Highlights #1 (hosted by Amy Okuda), and the first two eps of the new series "Morganville," and stuff. Let's see, I tried watching "The Fourth Door," which is a find-your-fate kind of thing from BlackBoxTV (a YouTube channel I may have heard about before, but never watched). This particular installment looked like it had potential to be interesting, but it made no sense and I never really managed to get anywhere with it. However, I did then try watching one of BlackBox's regular short films... which was weird, but not terrible. So I may check out some of their other films. Meanwhile, back on Halloweek, I watched the story of Bloody Bluebeard, told by Dael Kingsmill, who has a vlog on Geek & Sundry, which I must have watched some previous installment of, I think. She's definitely fun to watch, talking about myths or whatever. So I liked her story, here, though I'm still not sure if I'll ever get around to watching her vlog regularly. And I watched something called Resident Enis, which was mildly amusing, I guess. I started watching something about stop-motion animation, because the title had something about "Starburns," which I thought might have something to do with the character from Community, but it didn't. So I still have no idea who or what that is, in this context (I didn't get far into the video, even though I liked what little of it I did watch). And I watched a werewolf-themed parody of a Taylor Swift song, which I guess was kind of fun. And I watched something called "Girls Gone Evil," which was supposed to be funny, but I felt kind of neutral about it. One of the people in that video was Nikki Limo, who I guess has her own sketch comedy YouTube channel, but I don't recall having heard of her before.

October 28

Today on Halloweek, I watched something called "Worst Halloween Ever," which is also on Nikki Limo's channel. I found this much more amusing than "Girls Gone Evil." But I will say it's odd that this, and some other things I found on the list today, were definitely not on the list when I watched it yesterday (or technically today, because it was after midnight), but YouTube says they were uploaded yesterday. (Edit: it looks like Worst Halloween took the spot that Girls Gone Evil had on the list yesterday, and the latter has been renamed "Bitches Be Crazy," and appears on today's list.) Also today, I watched something called "Going Down?" which was apparently part of some web series I've never heard of that seems to be a parody of horror anthologies (with a sexy hostess). Anyway, it was mildly amusing. Then I watched Highlights #2 (hosted by Jeff Lewis), which talked about a few of the things I discovered on the list today (but uploaded yesterday) as well as one thing I saw yesterday, which seems odd. I feel like he just should have been talking about today's new stuff. And he didn't even mention any of the major stuff that's actually on the schedule, for either day. So I just don't get it. Then there was "8-Bit Haunted Dance Party," which has no dialogue, just music (that sounds like MIDI). Felicia Day went to some mansion where a bunch of people were wearing Halloween costumes. I think I recognized Amy Okuda (I know she was in it), but I definitely didn't recognize anyone else, nor any other names on the cast list. Anyway, they all just danced, and it was cute. Then a video with a guy carving a pumpkin to look like R2-D2... which was beyond awesome. Later I watched "Francis Hates Halloween," which I mostly thought was lame, but part of it was funny. Also today I started a page for Halloweek on the Geek & Sundry Wiki. Later still I watched Dael Kingsmill's regular G&S vlog, in which she told us her own spooky-yet-sardonic mash-up version of the story of the first Jack-O-Lantern. So that was fun. And then episode 3 of Morganville.

In non-G&S news, there was an episode of SciShow Space about Zombie Stars, which sounds more apropos for this week than it actually is, but... it's still cool that they did this ep this week.

October 29

Added a couple of commercials to my Halloween commercials page. Started a wiki page for Morganville. Watched Halloweek Highlights #3 with Jesse Cox, who's going to have a new show on Geek & Sundry next month. And a new Halloween episode of "Your Dungeon My Dragon," which was fun. Then I had to break from Halloweek to watch TV. On "Modern Family," Lily dressed as Where's Waldo. Gloria dressed as Fiona from the Shrek movies. Claire got caught up in a Halloween decorating rivalry with the new neighbors. Jay dressed as Prince Charming, which led to his being upset about having less hair than he used to. And stuff. Then on "Blackish," we learn about Dre's tradition of his family pranking each other on Halloween. But he gets upset when Zoey, the only one of his kids who was good at pranking, decides she was too old for such things. And then all the kids decide they don't want to do a family costume this year (they were supposed to be the Jackson 5). Of course there are some twists to the episode that didn't surprise me at all, but it was still fun. Then there was an un-Halloweeny episode of South Park, followed by a Halloween episode of "Key & Peele." And then after non-Halloweeny eps of The Daily Show and Colbert Report, I went back to Halloweek. Amy Dallen sang an awesome Halloween comic book song. An incredibly cute kid named Lindalee did a WHO'lloween Doctor Who fan art episode. There was some weird thing called the New Adventures of Peter and Wendy. And finally I watched episode 4 of Morganville. now it is way past sleepy time, so I bid you good night.

October 30

I watched a 1929 Disney short called Haunted House. And I made a wiki page for Who Killed Elliott Morgan?, a Geek & Sundry Halloween special from last year. And I wrote a little review for a pair of short films, Graveyard Jamboree and Mysterious Mose, both of which I'd seen before, but I've been meaning to rewatch so I could make that page about them. Did the same with Deadtime Stories, which I first saw earlier this year. And I've been watching a series of web animations called Childrin R Skary. And later I watched a bunch of stuff on Halloweek, including "Not the Flog," "Ridiculously Upsetting 'Sexy' Halloween Costumes," "The Clown and the Babysitter" (which was another entry in the anthology thing I mentioned before), "The Real Housewives of Horror," a "Vashta Nerada" shadowplay, etc.

October 31

The actual day has finally arrived! I'm wearing my Buffy, Slayer of the Vampyres t-shirt. ...I checked Halloweek, but nothing new had been uploaded yet. So I finished watching the Childrin R Skary videos. And then... this isn't really Halloweeny, though I do mention Halloween in passing... I rewrote the "Is it really that bad?" section of My thoughts on sexism. Later, I watched The Halloween Tree. And I had planned on watching another movie before watching TV, but I didn't get around to that. Instead, I watched some more Halloweek, including the season finale of "Morganville," and "Dead Girlfriend on Facebook" (the anthology thing again), "G&S Vlogs Halloween Special," "Ghost Waltz," etc. Then I had to stop to watch Grimm and Constantine on TV. They were both okay, I guess. Then I watched another DVD, The Hollow, while drinking some Shock Top. And then I watched "Werewolves," the last major video of Halloweek. That was fun. Kind of sad that it's over now. And yet... in spite of being 3am, I'm not ready for sleep. I have another DVD to watch. The Penny Dreadful Picture Show.

Well, there are other things I had hoped to get to. I said some time ago that I hoped to finish the Supernatural anime series by tonight, but I don't know if I saw any episodes since I said that. Somehow I never find the time, but I will finish it eventually. Hopefully before Christmas. And I had hoped to finish reading the book I've been reading for months, but rarely pick up. (The Time Traveler's Wife.) But alas, I'm far from finishing that. And I hoped to finish the book I've been writing for like 17 years, I mean I hoped to finish the friggin' first draft. Especially since there was going to be a Halloweenish scene, which is set on Samhain (on another planet). But I didn't get to that, dammit. (I could do it in the near future, though. I'm so damned close.) And... actually, I've accomplished a lot of Halloweenish stuff this month, and especially this week. So even if I regret not doing a few things, on the whole I'm pretty satisfied.

November 1

Watched Igor.

November 3

So, Friday was Halloween. Saturday I raked some leaves for my cousin Eileen, but there was a lot of work left to do. Then overnight Saturday, there was a light snow, so when I got up on Sunday, there was about half an inch on the ground. Which seems reasonable, for the first snow of the season. Then on Sunday afternoon and overnight, there was a lot more snow. When I got up Monday morning (today), it looked like about a foot. (Though that's just on the back deck, where the wind has a tendency to pile it up a lot more than in front of the house, which I haven't seen close up since I didn't go outside.) Anyway, the point of all this is that I was planning to watch Blackbeard's Ghost Sunday night, but the power went out. Actually, I'd been considering watching it in the afternoon, but decided against it, preferring to wait until after my shows (Bob's Burgers, Once Upon a Time, and Family Guy). But the power cut out before any of that came on, so I didn't get to watch any of it. Which is really freaking annoying. I probably could have watched the DVD of Blackbeard on my laptop, but didn't want to risk running out of battery life on that. So I waited until today.

November 10

This morning I watched this year's Halloween episode of "Bob's Burgers." I intended to watch it when it aired 8 days ago, but we lost power that night, so I had to wait til today to watch it on Hulu. It was reasonably fun. And now I think Halloween is pretty much over for the year (though we've still got plenty of candy).


2015
ekt's Halloween page