Halloween - November 5th?

Well, enough about politics and the total destruction of the American way of life.  Let's talk about Halloween.

With New Jersey still feeling the sting from Hurricane Sandy, Governor Chris Christie moved (by official, executive, double-secret decree) Halloween to Monday, November 5th.  This worked out great for The Pudge and his buddies who work the annual haunted house.  They did their last haunted house on Saturday (November 3rd) and that freed them up to go trick-or-treating.  Even though it was pretty cold, they had a great time.  And I didn't have to go with them - which was a big plus.

Some of the boys you know from past blogs.  Simple J is the Detective, The Pudge is the Standing Ghost (you'll have to take my word on that) and Birch is on the far right (I'm not sure what he was supposed to be).

Supposedly, someone took a video of a stroll through this year's haunted house.  If I can find it, I'll post it.  It was really impressive this year.  They had a midget - for real.  

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Borrowed from 1983's Something Wicked This Way Comes.  I love this movie.

By the pricking of my thumbs,

Something wicked this way comes.

It's Halloween and I haven't posted in a few months, so what the hell.  What can I say - I've been busy.  But, as many of you know, I've been lurking about on various blogs.    Anyway, this was the first thing I thought of for a Halloween posting in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.  The worst thing is that Springsteen did a song called 4th of July, Asbury Park, but it is colloquially known as Sandy - and being that this is the Land-o-Springsteen, that's all I hear on the local radio.  

 Sandy, the fireworks are hailin' over Little Eden tonight Forcin' a light into all those stony faces left stranded on this warm July
Down in the town, the Circuit's full of switchblade lovers, so fast, so shiny, so sharp
As the wizards play down on Pinball Way on the boardwalk way past dark
And the boys from the casino dance with their shirts open like Latin lovers on the shore
Chasin' all them silly New York virgins by the score

And Sandy, the aurora is rising behind us
This pier lights our carnival life forever
Oh, love me tonight, for I may never see you again
Hey, Sandy girl
My, my, baby

It does conjure a nice visual.  Although Bruce was singing about Asbury Park in the northern shore area, this could apply to all of the boardwalks along the New Jersey coast.  And they are all a long way away from ever being like that again.  The Atlantic City and Ocean City boardwalks got smoked.  Hundreds of yards of boardwalk just ripped to shreds with massive flooding and erosion on Long Beach Island.  The Mrs., The Pudge and I were fortunate enough to visit the Ocean City boardwalk in early October (for the annual Fall Block Party).  A nice memory, but I'm not really looking forward to seeing it again after what I saw on the news.  It'll take years to rebuild.

And old Buzz and stately Buzzkill Manor (with the newly completed north wing) fared very well.  No trees came crashing down to kill us in our sleep.  No large branches speared through the roof to impale us.  No hoards of storm-ravaged psychopaths came busting down the doors to steal our food.  No shivering in our cold, dark hovel for weeks...waiting for the National Guard to rescue us.  Hell, we lost power for less than a minute.  In other words, all of the things The Mrs.  tortured The Pudge and me about - didn't happen.
  The worst thing was that she insisted we all sleep in the basement on Monday night where I woke up with a major league back ache from the friggin' couch.  She's calmed down now - sort of.  We only got about 3" of rain officially, but it sure seemed like more.  The Pudge won't be going back to school until Thursday because parts of our town are still without power and there are a lot of trees down across roadways and traffic lights still out (as of Wednesday morning).

 Halloween has been officially moved to Friday.  This works out well for The Pudge because he will be able to go Trick-or-Treating with his buddies and still participate in the local haunted house, which was moved to Saturday.  They had the haunted house this past Friday and Saturday when the weather was near perfect and the turnout was huge.  For reasons I don't want to go in to, the haunted house was moved to our local swim club this year.  And I have to tell you, this was the best one ever.  I'll post some pictures if I can get them from The Pudge.

Friday is also The Smashing Pumpkin's concert in Camden.  The Mrs., The Pudge and I will brave the elements (it's an outdoor venue) to go see one of The Pudge's favorite bands.  I just hope The Mrs. doesn't bitch about the cold (temps will be in the 40s) the whole time.

Happy Halloween to all!!!

Halloween Terror...in January

So here we are in 2012 and I haven't posted in like 2 months. Mostly because of the holidays, school schedules, the in-laws visiting for several days and the Mrs' insane idea to add an addition on to stately Kill Manor (more on that in a minute). I discovered in coming back to the office this week that I can now access blogger again. I don't know how long that will last, but I'll take advantage of the magic as long as I can.  I need to look away from my work every now and then (to keep my sanity) and what better place to look than all my favorite cyber people's thoughts.

Anyway, I've been sitting on these Halloween pictures for a while and decided now would be a good time to post them.  This is the annual Haunted House that the Pudge and his buddy Birch do every year.  I talked about it here.  I had the distinct honor of being in the last group of the season and took a few shots from various sections of the house. 

That's the Undead Pudge on the left (I like that he's in a cage).  I'm not sure who that is on the right.  It's not Birch, though.

That catches me up through October.  I might have a Thanksgiving post.  We'll see.

Editor's Note:  The following rant gives you, my loyal readers, an idea of why I haven't been blogging much and it makes me feel better at the same time.

So back to the addition.  The Mrs' reasoning for needing an addition is because we have a relatively small kitchen and when we have people over for dinner or drinks, it gets cramped fast around the kitchen table.  I would agree with this.  However, is it worth a third of our house value to change it?  This is where our opinions differ and my opinion, well you know what that's worth.  She's totally out of her mind, of course. We have like 6 mortgage payments left to pay off the house and she now wants to (actually did) take out a HUGE home equity loan to add about 400 square feet to the back of the house. This will expand the kitchen and den areas.  And when I tell you HUGE, if you haven't shopped around for general contractors lately, the cost is outrageous - even in this economy.  And of course...I said yes.  I always say yes.  And we agreed that because of the cost, this would be our Christmas present - for the next 15 years.

Even with saying yes, she's pissed at me (at least I think she's pissed at me -  because she's not talking to me).  And I think it's because I did give her a Christmas present.  Several in fact, as she did for me.  But I spent way more money one her, including some expensive earrings that she picked out.  I think the center of her pissed-atude is a really cool Belgian Waffle Iron with 6 boxes of really good (according to Amazon) waffle mix.  The backstory here is that the Mrs loves waffles, always has.  We had a very cheap, basic waffle iron that was rarely used because it was a pain in the ass to clean.  And I noticed that at the last Marriott we stayed in for vacation, they had the nice, rotate-around waffle iron that she used for almost every free breakfast the two weeks we were there.  Great idea right?  Wrong.  As she very coldly put it, "She's not Suzy Homemaker and why am I giving her kitchen appliances?"  To top it off, she gave away 3 of the boxes of waffle mix to members of her family at Christmas dinner.  Sigh...

And this was only the tip of the iceberg.  This is what I'm up against.  There's a whole lot of other things going on that I won't go in to.  Don't get me wrong, I love her but this is a tough time for her and we don't have a dog for her to kick when she comes home from work...there's only me.  So now that she's not talking to me, I find that I have time to blog.  Woohoo!  I get the feeling there will be more rants in the future.

Happy New Year to all!

Culinary Smackdown - Supplemental

While I was preparing my Butternut and Acorn Squash Soup entry for the October Culinary Smackdown,  I multi-tasked a couple of other things.  Around Halloween, the Mrs likes to have candied apples.  Not caramel apples, not chocolate covered apples, but basic, red candied apples - with no nuts. 

These are getting harder and harder to find in stores.  So while I was roasting the squash, I had time to make candied apples.  I bought one of those kits where you add a shitload of sugar and water, bring it to a boil...

...then dip.

What a runny mess these turned in to.  Over the next couple of days, the candy slowly slid off.  I'm not even sure if the Mrs ate one, but she did thank me (which is a rarity).

After I took the squash out of the oven, and in an effort to be energy efficient, I made some Pillsbury Pumpkin Sugar Cookies.   The Pudge and I were all over those.

Culinary Smackdown - Winter Squash

Jen over at Our Good Food Life is hostessing this month's culinary Smackdown.  You can find challenge details on her blog. 

So for this challenge, I wanted to go the soup route for a couple of reasons.  First, I was thinking of a butternut squash and champagne soup I had about 15 years ago at a local restaurant and winery - the Renault Winery in Hammonton, NJ.  This soup was so amazing that I remember it 15 years later.  Alas, they have changed the restaurant since then and don't have the amazing meals they once served.  And after perusing the recipe sites, I was unable to find anything that resembled this soup.  I had to give it up.

Second, I wanted something on the sweet side, so I found this recipe at http://www.allrecipes.com/ - Butternut and Acorn Squash Soup.  I read a bunch of the reviews and made some changes accordingly.  This is what I ended up with:

Butternut and Acorn Squash Soup


Ingredients

• 1 butternut squash, halved and seeded
• 1 acorn squash, halved and seeded
• 3 tablespoons butter
• 1/4 cup chopped sweet onion
• 1 quart chicken broth
• 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/2 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• ground cinnamon to taste (optional)
• fresh parsley, for garnish

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Spray PAM on the cut side of the squash halves and place cut side down in a baking dish. Bake 45 minutes, or until tender. Remove from heat, and cool slightly. Scoop the pulp from the skins. Discard skins.

2. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat, and sauté the onion until tender.

3. In a blender or food processor, blend the squash pulp, onion, broth, brown sugar, cream cheese, pepper, and cinnamon until smooth. This may be done in several batches.

4. Transfer the soup to a pot over medium heat, and cook, stirring occasionally, until heated through. Garnish with parsley, and serve warm.

My starting ingredients in an artsy-fartsy Fall picture on the deck.  The Pudge will be turning that pumpkin into a jack-o-lantern this Halloween Weekend.



Butternut and Acorn Squash from the local Produce Junction.



They were tough to cut, but had great color.

I sprayed the cut side with PAM and roasted them in the oven for almost an hour.

I sauteed the onions and mixed everything in a pot with my immersion blender.  I love this machine.  No more exploding blenders of death.

Lastly, I wanted soup for a chilly Saturday afternoon - BLOCK PARTY!  Last year, one of my neighbors decided to revive the decades-gone block party tradition of our cul-de-sac street.  And she decided that a spring and fall party was in order.  Out of 15 houses on the street, we had 10 families participate (plus 2 that no longer live on the street).

Here is my soup in all it's crock-potted glory with a chopped parsley garnish.

Here the fractured-finger Mrs is ladling the creamy goodness in what could be called our block soup kitchen.

MMMMMM - soupy goodness!

One neighbor made these "lady fingers".  They were a little dry but cool to look at.  The kids liked them (too much nose picking going on though).

We had a Guess the  Weight of the Pumpkin Contest.  In what turned out to be the big controversey of the night, the winning number weight was 38 pounds, followed by a correction by the neighbors husband to 28 pounds (I told you 28 pounds when I weighed it!).  So 28 pounds took the pumpkin and 38 pounds took a consolation decoration, which the Mrs won.

There was also pumpkin painting for the kids.



Followed by marshmallow roasting in a fire pit in the center of the cul-de-sac.  Probably not the smartest thing to do with all the leaves around, but we had been drinking and it seemed right at the time.



Anyway, the soup was a huge hit.  Sweet (but not too), creamy and hot.  You could also taste the onion and cinnamon in the background.  I had at least five people ask for the recipe (which I promptly emailed the next day).  If I were to make it again, I might add a little bourbon to the onion saute step because I think that would add nice flavor.

Hiatus Report - Part 2

Turns out, right here in Philadelphia, we have the “Number 1 Haunted House in the U.S.” as rated by AOL City Guide (does anyone still use AOL?). And they are correct.  Terror Behind the Walls at Eastern State Penitentiary is without a doubt, the best haunted house I've ever been in.  I took the boys last year and The Pudge wanted to go again this year with a buddy of his who had never been there before.  The Boy is away at college, so he wasn't part of this.  The Pudge's buddy, Birch (I made that up to protect the innocent) is in Boy Scouts too.  But more importantly, his uncle (with whom he lives) runs a major, neighborhood haunted house in his backyard every year.  So The Pudge and I felt it appropriate that we take Birch with us.  The two of them will be part of the uncle's haunted house again this year, so I don't have to take them out trick-or-treating anymore. 

The uncle starts constructing his haunted house in August, and he really does a good job.  He's an English teacher and a published author of horror novels (go figure) although I have not read any of them.  He has never been to the penitentiary and I had hoped he would join us, but he had his own project to finish.

A note about Birch. I was a little concerned taking him to this because he came from a broken home and has some minor psychological problems. The Pudge has been friends with him since he transferred to his elementary school in 3rd grade. His uncle assured me he'd be okay. And he was, but I had that in the back of my mind the whole time we were there.

Anyway, the Penitentiary, opened in 1829 is massive.  Surrounded by 30 foot stone walls and covering 11 acres, this place is huge.  Al Capone did his first stint in prison here in 1929 - 8 months for carrying a concealed weapon.  It was abandoned in the early 1970s and fell in to disrepair .  It was opened again in 1988 as a historic landmark for tours and for the Terror Behind the Walls tour in 1991. 

I decided to go last Sunday night (02 October) because it's less expensive and presumably less crowded.  Street parking is tough because the prison is surrounded by row-house neighborhoods.  We got there around 7:30PM and found parking about 5 blocks away.  The ticket line wasn't too long and neither was the line to get in.  I was able to pass Birch off as a 12 year old for a half price ticket (yeah, the boy scout in me wasn't too proud of that, but they made money on us at the concession stand).  He's actually about 4 months older than the Pudge but very small.  I think his mother had some drug problems while she was pregnant - but I digress.

Part of the adventure is waiting in line.  They have dozens of actors in Hollywood quality special effects make-up that walk the lines and scare the crap out of people not paying attention to them.  They will even crawl up the middle of lines and sneak up on unsuspecting people (women mostly) - you hear screams every couple of minutes. 

Once you're in the prison, you go through different sections such as the infirmary and the prison block.  The place is run down and gives it that "Munsters" look, but completely safe.  There are actors everywhere, jumping out, making noise and opening doors and windows.  It's mostly dark or eerily lit, fog machines everywhere and a lot of other surprises.  It takes the better part of an hour to get through everything and is not for the easily scared or claustrophobic (The Mrs - she never goes to stuff like this). 

About half way through, we saw a couple of security people (non-costumed) talking to a teenage girl who was totally freaked out.  She did the rest of the tour with her head pressed into her mother's shoulder.  At the end, we had drinks and funnel cake.  While eating, we watched the actors sneak up on people in the concession area (who thought the show was over).  That was fun to watch.  We even saw one guy sneak up on an actor, who was sneaking up on an unsuspecting patron.  The actor bowed to the guy after he had been frightened. That was really funny.

It was probably around 9:30PM when we left, and going out we noticed the line was huge.  When we got there, I would say there was maybe 50 people in the ticket line.  When we left, there had to be 500 people in line.  After 9:00PM is half price for students, and there are several colleges in the area.  I'm glad I wasn't part of that.  All in all a good time was had by the three of us. Unfortunately, they don't allow pictures, so I have a few "borrowed" ones so you can get a feel for the place.  We'll probably go again next year.

Happy Halloween

Zombies Can't Dance...




...Or Can They?

Very crappy picture of The Pudge and his buddy working a neighborhood haunted house. This was the first year he didn't go Trick-or-Treating.

The tools of their trade.

Something for the Necrophiliacs out there - and you know who you are.

Ideas for Chickory - next year.

MAKE IT STOP! THE LEAVES, THAT IS.

Leaves are fallin' all around, time I was on my way
Thanks to you, I'm much obliged for such a pleasant stay
but now it's time for me to go, the autumn moon lights my way
for now I smell the rain, and with it, pain
and it's headed my way
Aw, sometimes I grow so tired
but I know I've got one thing I got to do...
-Ramble On by Led Zepplin





Kenneth: Is everyone there dead?
Steve: Well, dead-ish.
Kenneth: Is everyone there dead?
Steve: Yeah, in the sense that they all sort of, uh... fell down... and then got up... and started eating each other.

The Pudge (left) and his buddy on Halloween.