Halloween this year? It was fun! The Scary Social Double Feature was a hit. My sister and I had a few trick-or-treaters, though nowhere near as many as we had in the pre-COVID days. The neighborhood dads seemed to brighten up whenever the cry of “Trick or treat!” caused the door to be opened by a cheerful neighbor in an old-school Playboy bunny costume. Enjoy Halloween while you can. If the socialist morons ever get into power, I imagine we’ll hear a lot about how it’s disloyal to get your candy from individuals as opposed to depending on the government for it.

(And you know government treats are going to be the worst!)

The Silence

Wow, it sure is quiet around here.

It always takes a week or two for me to recover from the tsunami of activity that is Horrorthon. For the entire month of October, this site is all about horror. This year, we had a record-setting 783 posts and we also set a record for page views. That means that we had an average of 25 posts a day. That also means that, every day, I was not only watching movies and writing posts but I was also checking and re-checking the schedule to make sure that we didn’t have any posts accidentally scheduled to drop at the same time. It was a lot, but it was satisfying to watch as the TSL writers came together to shape October.

And now, suddenly, it’s November and things are much calmer and I no longer have to check the schedule every hour. It’s going to take a while to adjust, but it’s totally worth it.

“Don’t vote. It just encourages the bastards.” — P.J. O’Rourke

Tomorrow is Election Day, which means that we’re being bombarded by the get-out-the-vote evangelists. “Bring some water, bring a friend, bring something to snack on, this is the most important election of our lifetime, blah blah blah.” It’s the same crap that we hear every year. The truth of the matter is that one of the great things about America is that you don’t have to vote if you don’t want to. If there isn’t a candidate running who you feel like supporting, you’re not required to choose the “lesser of two evils,” no matter how much people try to tell you differently. Indeed, when a state like Maine first nominates a guy with a Nazi tattoo and then replaces him with some barely literate dumbass who married his own cousin, I think it’s offensive to expect voters to just grin and bear it.

Indeed, this has been a year of terrible candidates, many of whom are a bit on the seamy side. In Maine, they had Graham Platner and now they have Troy Jackson, and the amazing thing is that it could have been worse as there was a movement to draft Ms. Rachel as Platner’s replacement. In Michigan, a five-foot anti-Semite apparently has even odds of getting elected. The state of Alaska is determined to destroy itself with its stupid ranked-choice voting system. Meanwhile, in my beloved state of Texas, I’m being told that I have to pick between a corrupt career politician and an annoying little twerp who gives off creepy youth-minister vibes. (Whoever thought that the perfect closing message in the Senate campaign would be a commercial of James Talarico looking like an automated mannequin in Wrangler jeans deserves to be run out of politics.)

I gave serious thought to not participating this year, but that would mean giving up my voting streak. Plus, I have one friend who has been really obnoxious with all of her political nonsense this year, so I’m planning on voting the opposite of her so that I can cancel out her ballot. That said, I’m not going to tell you to vote. I’m going to tell you to make up your mind and do what you feel is right for you.

Go see a movie, no matter what you do

Going to the movies is a part of my Election Day ritual and I recommend it to everyone. After the icky business of voting, it’s nice to escape into fantasy for an hour or two. Even if you don’t vote, watch a movie!

Now that I about it….

It has been a while since I’ve watched The Godfather.