Cleanup on Aisle Five

Geepers, I'm a mess today.

Here it is, Halloween at last, and I should be giving you all a blog about how scary and fun it all is. I was all set to dress up my life-sized, cardboard Dean Martin in my feathery, sequined Mardi Gras mask and pose in my very own costume (a T-shirt that says "Drop Dead" and a witches hat), and give you a visual you'd never forget.

But then last night, Dale ran over one of the cables that feed the TV from the satellite. Sorry, did I mention he ran over it with the lawnmower? Yeah, sliced that puppy in two, instantly cutting off the signal and my regularly scheduled programming. He got it mostly working with the remaining cable, but he needs to purchase a new cable in order for us to DVR one channel and watch another. I predict much fighting over the remote until he gets this done.

To distract myself from Dale's attempts to fix the cable, I went to the store to buy our pumpkin to carve. We always decorate the house and carve a pumpkin. Unfortunately, all of the Albertson's pumpkins were warty. I mean look at these things. Our jack-o-lanterns are going to look like they've got acne.

But he's my baby!

Also, last night Marcus went to a Halloween party. I don't know any of the particulars, except that he came home to get his Renaissance costume to wear. Marcus is a 19-year old college student living in the dorms at CSU Long Beach; he could be going to a party every night of the week, drinking heavily and trying every drug on the planet. I have no idea what he does. I only know that when I know he's at a party, I have a rather fitful night's sleep and look around the next morning for some reassurance that he's okay.

Today I saw a post from him on Facebook, so I can relax. He at least made it back to his computer.

To top everything off, I can't find my Mardi Gras mask. I honestly can't remember where I put it, but two months from now, I'll be walking through the house and the image of where it is will hit my brain like a locomotive. It's how things work with me.

So today, I'm not going to give you my planned post about Halloween at the Carline house and how it has changed over the years and ask if you decorate your house and dress up and ask you to reminisce about your kids and the night the dog ate the pumpkin, etc. Instead, I'm going to ask a question that's been bugging me all night:

Why aren't there horror films about big, dangerous animals?

We have horror films about mutant small animals, like ants and lizards and octopi and even rabbits.



We have horror films about possibly dangerous, yet smallish creatures that attack in numbers, like bees and pirranha and spiders and rats. But how about lions and tigers? And bears? They're pretty nasty when they're just starved for a couple of days and then turned loose. What if they were starved and mutant? Why doesn't anyone ever make a horror movie about that?

If I made a horror movie, I'd make it about bears. Mutant teddy bears that all turn into large, slobbering, real grizzlies and eat all the parents, and no one would know how to stop them because we don't hunt bears in New York City, for Pete's sake. The mayor would have to call in some old, lonely, misogynistic guy from northern Alaska who hates the city and would just as soon see all these miscreants eaten by the rampaging teddy-grizzlies, but they give him enough money for booze  and a plane ticket home, and he hunts the bears down. All except the last one, who is a very smart she-bear, and she is shot by the plucky female sheriff's deputy, who has been dogging Grizzly Man's steps from the beginning. And then, they'd have an awkward moment, where Grizzly Man would like to like Plucky Female, except it's against his religion so he mumbles some kind of "Gee if you're ever in the Arctic Circle, come by and I'll defrost your mukluks," invitation. And as he gets on the plane, you see a little teddy bear has somehow made its way into his duffle bag, and it has the weirdest little grin.

And this would be its theme song.



Happy Halloween!