Something Wicked This Way Comes

My wife combs through the candy to find any suspect or malicious nuggets of sugary goodness through the mounds of candy my son, the All Hallows Eve prospector, received trick-or-treating. The Jack O’ Lanterns lit on the porch stare, standing vigil against the myriad of spooks seeking refuge in our house as the evening winds to a close.

One of the Jack O’ Lanterns lighting the porch signifies the first pumpkin hollowed out and carved by my son in a tradition that spans centuries. Stingy Jack, based on Irish folklore, invited the devil for a drink. The festivities ended when Jack, true to his name, refused to pay the barkeep for the drinks and in a ghoulish plan convinced the devil to turn himself into a coin to pay for the beverages.

Once the devil had changed, Jack decided to keep the coin and plopped it into his pocket next to a silver cross, thus preventing the devil from changing back. Jack eventually freed the devil on the condition that the devil not return for a year and if Jack ever died, the devil would not collect his soul.

The next year the devil appeared for dinner. Jack being a crafty one soon convinced the devil to retrieve some delicious fruit from the upper branches of a tree for supper. Once the devil had ascended, Jack quickly carved the sign of a cross into the bark on the trunk of the tree, trapping the devil among the branches. Furious, the devil agreed not to bother Jack for 10 more years.

The legend reports that Jack died before the 10 years was up, and true to his word, the devil did not collect Jack’s soul…but therein lay a problem. God did not want such an unsavory soul in heaven and the devil would not collect Jack’s soul. Humiliated and angry at Jack’s tricks, the devil cast Jack into the darkness of night with only a piece of coal to light his way. Jack carved a turnip for the chunk of coal and wanders the night to this day.

The Scots and the Irish soon began carving their own scary version of Jack’s lantern out of potatoes and turnips and placing them in windows or near doors to frighten Stingy Jack or any other wandering spirits away. Soon after arriving in the Americas, people found pumpkins, a native fruit, perfect for making Jack O’ Lanterns and the tradition continues.

Hope everyone had a great Halloween…even you Chelene.

Happy Halloween!

Round about the caldron go;
In the poison'd entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone,
Days and nights has thirty-one
Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i' the charmed pot!

Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire, burn; and caldron, bubble.

Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and howlet's wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire, burn; and caldron, bubble.

Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witch's mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg'd i' the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse,
Nose of Turk, and Tartar's lips,
Finger of birth-strangl'd babe
Ditch-deliver'd by a drab,—
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger's chaudron,
For the ingredients of our caldron.

Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire, burn; and caldron, bubble.

Cool it with a baboon's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.
      -MacBeth Act IV

I got a rock...

One of my favorite cartoons as a kid...couldn't wait till Halloween to watch it and still get a get out of it.

It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown

October Haunting

The leaves are turning colors, it’s Friday and rain is cascading against the windows. It’s as cold outside as the chocolate bars in the fridge, saved for hot cocoa this evening and the house smells like fall with wood is waiting next to the fireplace…looks like the setting is right to scare the little ones by telling ghost stories by a fire tonight.

My son doesn’t scare that easily though, as demonstrated by our visit to Bunny Man Bridge, the boy is the adventuresome sort. Always willing to risk life and limb (so long as they’re mine, it’s daylight and there’s an easy escape route) exploring abandoned ghost towns, sites of macabre occurrences or any other multitude of bizarre places…like Chuck E. Cheese’s.

Not too terribly long ago, we heard of a place called “Hell House” off of Bonny Branch Road in Maryland. The rumor of this place typifies the mayhem that surrounds larger abandoned building; stories of young children, satanic worship and murder. The “house”, not visible from the road, is a short hike through underbrush and a long climb up a set of ancient stairs.

Built in the 1800’s, the story goes, the house was built as a religious reformatory for teenage girls. The head priest and nuns began dabbling in the occult and girls began disappearing, murdered for satanic sacrifices with the events culminating in the ritual execution of five girls in the entrance hall and the suicide of the head priest. It’s said the screams of the young victims can still be heard.

During the day it’s a grand building, neglected and falling into ruin. In spite of how close it is to the road, it’s eerily quiet and rather peaceful, interesting architecturally and historically even without the campfire rumors

The area is interesting as well and the nearby town is purported to be extremely haunted.

Work ownz joo

As you know, the boy and I decided to play hooky for most of the day on Wednesday. Perhaps the timing was ill-planned and I failed to realize that we had a major database switchover planned for that night and so I paid for my decadence over the next two days.

Wednesday night we checked and verified that everything was in place and confirmed that all the scheduled jobs to extract data from systems the database was dependent on and the mechanisms for delivering the data were secure and ready to run. Around midnight we were finished rebuilding the database on the new server. We agreed to get back together Thursday morning at 4:30 am to validate that the scheduled extracts ran and all the reports generated for the company executives could be produced on time.

Not everything ran as smoothly as we would have hoped, but considering the extent of the system, it ran better than we had expected.

After working into the wee hours on Thursday, and again waking up early on Thursday, that evening I was more exhausted than I realized when I lied down to watch cartoons with my son. I ended up falling asleep and snoozing for 4 hours, waking up for a couple and then crashing for the rest of the night.

I asked my wife why she didn’t wake me up and she said, “You never sleep that much, I figured you needed it.”

I’m very refreshed.

Life is too Short

Paul Tsongas once said, "No one on his deathbed ever said 'I wish I spent more time at the office'" and with that in mind, yesterday, my son stayed home (not too concerned about that, straight A student and in gifted classes) and I ducked out of work for a “Life is too Short” day. Lunch at Ruby Tuesday, a trip to the book store games and whatever else we wanted to do, the day was ours.

I took the opportunity to do up this pen and ink drawing of my boy munching on some chips.

Life is too short.

Lost and not found

Be careful what you wish for, we’ve jumped from summer straight into what feels like winter. Tried riding my motorsickle today and froze my….fingers off.

Where did fall go?!?

Illustration Friday - Ghost

I decided to jump back into Illustration Fridays. I had a good time with them when I was entering and life just got a bit busy for me to continue (college and all that jazz). Here's my entry into Illustration Friday with "Ghost".

Enjoy.

Obituary for Common Courtesy

To say that I had lost respect for most of my fellow man would be somewhat of an understatement. Rather than courtesy swaggering about as the expected norm, a sort of me-centric attitude had become the invasive practice in the burg of D.C. Metro and regardless what act of magical liberality was performed, it was greeted with the nonchalantness generally reserved for servants of royalty. The disregard for social minutiae should have come as no surprise when I approached the father of one of my son’s schoolmates and informed him that his son had just slammed his car door into the side of my truck and tattooed a grinning dent on the driver’s side door.

My request was simple enough, delivered with as much humility as I could muster given the Grand Canyon that had just been imprinted on my vehicle, “Excuse me, would you mind asking your son to be more careful when opening his door next to other people’s cars. He just opened his door into my truck and scratched the paint and left a nice size dent.”

“He did not.” He replied.

“I beg to differ; I just watched your door bounce off the side of my truck.”

“You know, these spaces…they’re too small.”

“I’m 6 feet tall, much bigger than your son and I managed to get out of my truck without hitting yours.” I said, my blood pressure clawing its way to my temples, and the all too familiar anger-twitch visiting my lip.

“I’m parked between the white lines.”

“So am I.”

“Let me see the white lines.” He said exiting his vehicle.

Age and fatherhood have served me well, and while similar circumstances would have been the calling card for confrontation in my youth, my son by my side and the generosity of wisdom visited upon me by the absence of adolescence placed a lid on my anger containing it just out of reach.

He walked around to my truck, “As you can see, my truck is within the lines as well.” I said.

Perhaps my expectations were too great, and with visions of gallant courtesy arriving to slay the me-centric demons, I stood by waiting to receive my prize – an apology however, unlike the fairy tales and more true to life, I would not live happily ever after.

After mumbling something, he retreated to his truck and proceeded to leave. Disgusted, I followed suite and left for home.

The next day, while retrieving my son from school we were walking along the path that leads to the parking lot when, we were approached by the father.

“I wanted to apologize for yesterday,” he said. “I don’t speak English very well and didn’t understand everything you were saying. I didn’t park in the parking lot today; I didn’t want the same thing to happen, so I parked out by the street.”

All I had intended was to bring the incident to his attention and all I expected was an apology. He held out his hand and I took it and everything was right.

Apparently I was wrong…Courtesy is still alive and reports of his death have been greatly exaggerated.

Now at least once a week < insert applause >

Soon after my last post, I finally came down with the plague myself...as short lived as it was, it still lingers while the rest of my family has returned to health. Just like the saying, the bigger they are, the more they cry like a simpering baby...or something like that.

Well, we got the chance to take the trailer out and had a blast. We headed down to Winchester Virginia, near where we take the little ones pumpkin picking every year. After setting up camp we went to pick the motliest bunch of pumpkins this side of the Rio Gourd.

I'm going to try to post at least every Friday; of course I neglected today and got the new blog skin up.

What do y'all think?

Insomnia

Are drugs necessary for a tortured soul? Is indecision capable of replacing a needle; self-doubt substitute’s chemicals and lack of an obsession replaces a drained bottle of whiskey propped against an outdated copy of TV Guide. The questions pondered while your head lay against a crisp pillow, tainted colors of Halloween, orange of the tungsten street lamp outside interrupted with shadows of contrasting black. The fever-induced promises you made to yourself, while hallucinating manifestations of your inner demons, lie crumpled next to the self realization that all is for nothing. Breezes sneak through the window carrying the chilling allure of purity, wickedly spice the skin. The assurance of youth waits in the ashes to rise during the next bout of inspiration that seems centuries ago. Insinuation of sleep like a cracked cough held against glass, the covers and waking dreams of salvation pulled tightly against you.