As I ended my last post, the Halloween party was a one off, and we had no intention of ever repeating it. It was fun, but a project that took two months to create, and a few hundred dollars to make happen. 1998 came and went… and as Halloween rolled around the kids were excited about trick or treating – even more so because they had missed the previous year. Since Mariah was still too young to really enjoy the holiday, I chose to stay at the house and pass out candy to the neighbors.
Mariah went to sleep relatively early, and I set up a chair on the front porch, put on a mask, had some spooky music wafting from the house, and got ready. I put a strobe light behind me, and brought out the fog machine to haze up the driveway…. and waited for the trickle of kids to cautiously walk up the driveway.
That’s how I imagined the night anyway… It didn’t work that way.
Nope. What did happen is that about 200 people came calling. “Where’s the Haunted House?” “You ruined my kid’s holiday!” “No Haunt? Loser” “I drove all the way from…” I was shocked. Then pissed off. How dare these idiots tell me I owe them entertainment. Or that I need to spend money to make their holiday special. SCREW YOU PEOPLE!!!!
When my wife got back from trick or treating with the kids, she listened to me rant about the a** holes that showed up that night, and after I stopped and calmed down she simply said… “looks like you have a job to do now”.
And that is when the Haunt was really born, at least in my mind, because that is when it became official.