Tuesday, October 10, 2006

trick or treat ...

When I was a kid, there were only two holidays that really mattered: Christmas and Halloween.

Christmas, of course, meant presents, which usually meant toys. And Halloween meant candy.

When you're a kid, there's not much that matters more than toys and candy. Might as well be water and oxygen.
OK, I will admit that Thanksgiving has always been one of my favorite holidays too -- if you ever tasted my parents' cooking, you'd understand why. Just typing this has made me crave roast turkey, stuffing, mashed taters and gravy. Fuck I'm hungry!
OK ... where was I?

Oh yes ... candy and Halloween.

If you were a kid after the start of the 1980s, Halloween is a much different thing. We didn't worry about X-raying candy. Parents didn't worry overly much about sending kids out in the neighborhood to go trick-or-treating. Homemade Rice Crispy treats in Plastic Wrap was an acceptable treat; it wasn't thrown out. Things have changed a lot since I was a kid.

Same goes for the candy. There is SO much more variety these days. Candy options were a bit more limited. The bulk was hard candy -- Lifesaver lollipops or Dumdums, root beer barrel candy, butterscotch discs, peppermints. There was bubblegum. The PREMIUM houses were the ones that gave out Hershey's miniatures. The GREAT houses gave out regular-sized candy bars, but those were rare.

Now, almost everyone gives out the good, premium candy -- individually packaged, small versions of Reese's peanut butter cups, Snickers, Three Musketeers, etc.

Back then, after you were done, you sat down with your brothers and sisters and worked out trades for your favorites and theirs.

And boy did you make your stash last as long as possible -- helped tremendously by mothers not very willing to let children indulge their sweet teeth (sweet tooths?). They would let you have a few pieces, then would put the bags (labeled, naturally, so the kids wouldn't fight over which was whose) into the kitchen cabinet over the refrigerator, where kids couldn't reach without climbing on the countertops. It would be doled out a few pieces at a time. I always had a strong suspicion that some of it went to sweet-toothed (sweet-teethed) parents. I know I would have stolen candy from my kids, if I had any!

And for those of you who haven't seen the larger version of my October avatar ... I present Evil DZER!





9 comments:

Madame X said...

OK so this is how the candy gets divied in our house.

ALL of the candy gets put in a huge pile.
Momma gets ALL the SNICKERS cuz I took 'em out trick or treating.
Then all the CRAP CANDY (hard candy, non chocolate items EXCEPT candy corn) goes into a bin for our candy houses we make in December.
The rest gets doled out a few pieces at a time.

November 1st and Easter morning are the only 2 days a year I allow my kids to eat candy for breakfast.
The other days I don't allow them but they eat it anyway.

David said...

I had it worked out with my ex to always take my daughter on trick or treat night. Because she and her mother gave out candy together. Last year was the final year for taking my daughter out *sigh* she has turned twelve and thinks it is for babys. As she got older it was much harder to steal her candy. I just had to be sneaky about it. Except, one year I wore a cow costume(utters included)and my own candy. It was so much fun to be able to dress up once again.

Suze said...

Dzer, you don't look evil, just a horny little devil. ;)

We don't get many kids trick or treating any more, I suppose it's too dangerous to let them do it.

As a child I looked forward to doing it for weeks. We shared out our own sweets and got told off quite a lot for not eating our dinners. Lol

Stephanie said...

I so heart evil dzer.!!

We trick or treat twice - once the sunday before here then again on halloween at home -- mas candy. I'll send ya some.

ArtfulDodger said...

I never trick or treated as a child... hmm, that does start to explain alot.

KJ said...

Now I want a mini reese cup

I love the picture!!

I'm not here. said...

Lurve the photo!
:oD

Shay said...

You know what's REALLY bad? My candy used to last so long that I would still have hard candies (my least favourite) left by the next year and I used to dump them into the candy bowl for my parents to give out to other unsuspecting kids! Mwa haha

Jim said...

Don't tell me, don't tell me...

lets see, you got your hair cut right?

No!

You look different but I just can't put my finger on it.

Gimme a minute, eh.