Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thankgiving to my readers in the United States.  I thought I'd share some of my Thanksgiving-related finds from over the years.  No special story behind these, just things I liked and now use.  First up are some honeycomb decorations.  We had a Hallmark honeycomb turkey when I was a kid. It was our sole Thanksgiving decoration.  My sister and I would fight over assembling it.

 

Ghost at the Window: A Review

Last month during the Countdown to Halloween, I presented a handful of young adult books with a haunting theme and asked my readers to vote for one which  I would then review.

Well, after a whopping 3 votes (each for a different book), it was clear I would need to flip a coin.

And the winner is...Lady M with "Ghost at the Window"!

Halloween 2021 Post-Mortem

Well, Halloween 2021 is permanently written.  No more decorating, just deconstruction.  My last Countdown to Halloween post has been posted (well, technically, this is the last).

Once again, I was able to dig up enough material for 31 days of fun, I hope you enjoyed. I'd say it seems like it gets harder every year, but to be honest, this year, though daunting at first, seemed like a breeze.

And that's how the month passed, with a breeze.  Here we are on November 1st and I'm posting my traditional post-mortem (By the way, that would make a great rival breakfast cereal for General Mills' Monster cereals:  Post Mortems).

So let's now look at how Garage Sale Finds (known as Stranger Finds this time of year) did this past month.

Total views for this month were 11,042.  Of course, it doesn't mean all of those were for the month of October posts.  It was a few thousand over an average month though, so the Countdown does definitely boost readership, if slightly.  Overall, readership has been lackluster, simply due to the severe decline in blog reading in general.  Most people turn to YouTube channels now for this form of entertainment.

Trick 'n Treat!

Well this is it, the night of nights.  31 days of preparation have all lead up to this.  And we know what "this" is.  It's all about "Trick or Treating".  Or is it "Trick-r-Treating".  Or is it "Tricker Treating".  Or is it "Trick 'n Treating" as these die cuts say.  Either way, it's all about the candy.  Grab your bucket and let's all walk up to the haunted house.

This set of Trick 'n Treaters was created by Peck in the 1970's.  The question the children should be asking is, are the ghosts tricking or are they treating?

Baron Weirwulf's Haunted Library

I would be remiss if I neglected to post at least one horror comic this season.  And while this 1979 issue of Charlton Comics' Haunted  may be a bit tame by the classic 1950's horror comics standards, I offer it in the spirit of the season nonetheless. I don't have much to add to these pages and honestly, I'm running so far behind on decorations this season due to weather and work, I need all the time I can get to prepare for the big day.  So enjoy and tune in tomorrow for the final installment of The Countdown to Halloween.

Monster Mask Memories

Sometime around Thursday of the week, I'll begin perusing the upcoming sales on estatesales.net. If something catches my eye, I'll make note of it.  Typically, there isn't much that will get me to a sale before it opens. I've gotten to the point where waiting in line for an hour isn't worth whatever I'm going for.  I try to hit sales at least an hour after the open when the lines are gone and hope to find something others have missed.

When I saw these two masks on the site for a sale a couple weeks ago, I reconsidered my approach.

Magik Revisited

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a magician.  I asked for, and received, the Presto Magic kits with standard illusions and tricks such as the Multiplying Spots, Penetrating Vision, the Endless Water Vase, the Bullet trick and the Ball and Vase trick.  I learned to do the tricks, and learned others pouring over the included Adams' 101 Magic Tricks booklet and other magic books I bought from the Scholastic flyer, but they were all simple and most people knew how they worked.  I could never afford the professional magic tricks sold in dedicated magic shops.  I continued to pick up magic sets at sales over the years, but of course, I never became a magician.

This summer, my family vacationed in the Smoky Mountains in Gatlinburg, Tennessee.  As a surprise, my wife booked a visit to Evanswood Magic Mansion.  I had seen a Youtube video by Jacob the Carpetbagger doing a tour of The Magic Mansion and had mentioned to her it would be cool to see in person. The day before we left, my wife presented me with the tickets (well, at least an email with digital tickets).

The night of the tour, we pulled up to the house silouetted in darkness.  Well, actually, the tour started at 7:00 p.m. and it was still light out, but "silouetted in darkness" sounds better.  Below is a photo I took when we left.