David Hammond wrote: -- and I will warn them that it tastes a little like bad eggs and matches.

That's the best description of the Durian odor I've heard yet. Do the candies smell bad?

Hi,

How many pounds did you buy of the Durian candy? I'm curious how optimistic you believe your audience will be to your offer. You gave away 75 green tea bags in the past, was it with the same offer: get the classic candy give away or get 'the good stuff?' I like your enticement this year: get one classic candy OR two (off-beat) candies.

I hope you will make a video clip of one of your trick-or-treaters having to decide. I want especially to see their reaction to your send-off. Even if the video portion isn't very good, the audio may be treasure!

Have fun!

Regards,

Mhays wrote:

David Hammond wrote: -- and I will warn them that it tastes a little like bad eggs and matches.

That's the best description of the Durian odor I've heard yet. Do the candies smell bad?

No, they don't smell bad, and for experienced durian eaters the taste is slight. However, my experience has been that children are much more sensitive to strange tastes and that even this hint of the stinky fruit will seem be quite powerful to them.

Cathy2 wrote:Hi,

How many pounds did you buy of the Durian candy? I'm curious how optimistic you believe your audience will be to your offer. You gave away 75 green tea bags in the past, was it with the same offer: get the classic candy give away or get 'the good stuff?' I like your enticement this year: get one classic candy OR two (off-beat) candies.

I hope you will make a video clip of one of your trick-or-treaters having to decide. I want especially to see their reaction to your send-off. Even if the video portion isn't very good, the audio may be treasure!

Have fun!

Regards,

I bought about half a pound of the durian candy, and mixed it in with other candy I got from Aji Ichiban in Chinatown: various flat marshmallows stuff with fruit paste, sweet and sour plums (these are very interesting; they're frim, fruity and strange), and a number of potently flavorful gummie items.

Parents get kind of nervous when strangers start photographing their kids; maybe I can get some of the neighborhood kids I know to make the big decision re: candy on video.

David - so you want your house TP'd, creamed, and egged?

Louisa Chu wrote:David - so you want your house TP'd, creamed, and egged?

The kids do have the option of standard Mars products, and it's been my experience that for the right kid (maybe 1 in 5), a more peculiar option is much appreciated.

I'd have the kids ask for both - and we'd still Saran Wrap your car.

Louisa Chu wrote:I'd have the kids ask for both - and we'd still Saran Wrap your car.

And get this, we're having some cement work done on our house today, so any kids with a grudge will have the opportunity to provide me with permanent payback for handing out durian candy.

Louisa Chu wrote:David - so you want your house TP'd, creamed, and egged?

This is essentially the question my wife posed when I suggested that we hand out Kashi Bars and Fiber One Bars and Odwalla Bars this year (because we have a lot of them on hand).

I'm still going to sneak a few of each into the candy cauldron, even though I completely understood her point.

=R=

Not to sound like a Grinch, which I will, but how do you get kids not to ring or knock? I've tried keeping the light off, but that doesn't work, and I'm afraid putting up a "no candy" sign will make the neighbors think we're sex offenders! It completely freaks the dogs out, and I want to spare them.

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Louisa Chu wrote:David - so you want your house TP'd, creamed, and egged?

This is essentially the question my wife posed when I suggested that we hand out Kashi Bars and Fiber One Bars and Odwalla Bars this year (because we have a lot of them on hand).

I'm still going to sneak a few of each into the candy cauldron, even though I completely understood her point.

=R=

I have rarely seen a house in our quadrant abused by tricksters. There are just too many people on the street to get away with that (we live in a kid-dense neighborhood, for which I feel very fortunate).

About the "health bars" ....why not hand them out to the parents, who would probably consider them a most age-appropriate treat?

leek wrote:Not to sound like a Grinch, which I will, but how do you get kids not to ring or knock? I've tried keeping the light off, but that doesn't work, and I'm afraid putting up a "no candy" sign will make the neighbors think we're sex offenders! It completely freaks the dogs out, and I want to spare them.

Have you tried an "honor system" candy bucket at the bottom of your stoop? Or leaving the door open and taking the screens out of the screen door? Sometimes it's just the knocking and ringing that do it - as long as I'm alert and beat the kids to the door, our dogs are OK. Conversely, we try making sure the dogs have some really, really high-stakes hard-to-chew treats.

I suppose you could always put up a temporary gate...or add "nervous dogs" to your sign.

leek wrote:Not to sound like a Grinch, which I will, but how do you get kids not to ring or knock? I've tried keeping the light off, but that doesn't work, and I'm afraid putting up a "no candy" sign will make the neighbors think we're sex offenders! It completely freaks the dogs out, and I want to spare them.

As an aside, I have a very dear friend who unapologetically has posted handwritten "No Candy Here!" signs in the past with moderate success. As a consequence, she has endured years of ribbing from me about how mean she was, and how she could have at least said "Sorry, No Candy Here," etc. Now that the sex offender sign says practically the same thing, she feels somewhat justified in getting her point across, and she's been joking (albeit not really) how she wants to get a hold of one of those signs. She even found a news story where there was a run on those signs somewhere, clearly being acquisitioned by folks who were not, indeed, sex offenders.

I don't give out candy anymore because I'm not home when they come by at 4:00. But in past years, even when I have given the candy out, run out, and shut the light off, and had a locked gate to prevent kids from coming to the door, they will still ring the bell. I find that nothing -- nothing -- will keep some folks from doing that. But if you post a sign, without regard to what some people think, you might have a reduction in bellringers.

David - it's not the durian candy that's so bad but that you're messing with the transaction. Kid rings your doorbell, you answer, kid says "trick or treat", you give candy. This whole multiple choice thing is just asking for trouble - and some baaad words in wet cement.

Ron - a Fiber One bar? Oh that might call for weed killer words on your lawn.

leek - Mhays's honor system surprisingly works. I had my parents do that one year when they physically couldn't keep getting up to answer the door. This year they're back in form so the kids had better watch out. BTW what's wrong with a little psychotic barking? Lets the dogs get it out of their systems and scares the kids.

My dad likes to give away little packets of Planters peanuts in addition to candy. Kids LOVE them. The first time he gave them away he had kids come back the next day to ask if he had any left. Bar snacks for kids. Gotta love it.

In our neighborhood, if the lights are out, the kids skip the house-
It means no one's home or there's no candy here
Lights on mean come ring my bell...

snickers, reeses sticks , milky ways, $100G bars,
gummy life savers and gummy body parts this year

(one son doesn't like chocolate (GASP! )
but is a gummy fan, this year...

I like Cathy's idea of tea bags....
maybe I'll add a few in....I've got tons....

Louisa Chu wrote:you're messing with the transaction.

It's what I do.

Louisa Chu wrote:Ron - a Fiber One bar? Oh that might call for weed killer words on your lawn.

Well, I know that some of the kiddies like to stay regular

=R=

Ron - three words - Ding Dong Ditch.

Louisa Chu wrote:Ron - three words - Ding Dong Ditch.

Well, like Hammond's, our neighborhood is usually very mellow but I know that you live nearby and often wear all black, so I will be especially cautious with my distributions this evening.

=R=

maybe the little tikes would like green tomatoes? I've got about 20 lbs left in my garden.

irisarbor wrote:In our neighborhood, if the lights are out, the kids skip the house-
It means no one's home or there's no candy here
Lights on mean come ring my bell...

That's pretty much what happens in our neighborhood, too. I think this works because I happen to live in a target-rich area, so a few houses that have to be skipped is no big deal. We generally keep the lights on until candy runs out or around 8:30. Any later than that, and I probably don't want to see who's on the other side of the door, anyway.

I'm getting ready to take our kids out in a little bit. They're still small ish (4 and 6) and they don't like to go door to door after dark. They are hoping to get something peanut related since after two days of Halloween parties with 'nut alert' flyers going home they didn't get anything like that.

I've got about 300 pieces of candy to give out, and I guess I'm getting old, but my hard and fast rule is no costume, no candy. (I.e the 14 year olds that show up at 6:30 carrying a pillow case better have a creative answer to "what are you for Halloween?")

We have a lot of shops nearby, and they all do trick or treat until they close around 6. Otherwise, I see few kids trick or treating on our street, as at least on our block the kids are either too young or too old.

How about
"Sorry, No Candy Here, only Psychotic Doggies"

?

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Louisa Chu wrote:Ron - three words - Ding Dong Ditch.

Well, like Hammond's, our neighborhood is usually very mellow but I know that you live nearby and often wear all black, so I will be especially cautious with my distributions this evening.

=R=

No black tonight my friend. Tonight I blend. Might be wearing a minivan.

Louisa Chu wrote:Ron - three words - Ding Dong Ditch.

At least that's better than Ding Dong Sack-Whack.

Erzsi wrote: (I.e the 14 year olds that show up at 6:30 carrying a pillow case better have a creative answer to "what are you for Halloween?")

Oh, I give them costumes...Printable mask Love the shock when you hand them a Britney mask...

Louisa, out of curiousity, are you celebrating Halloween in Alaska? Is what I saw on PBS about Polar Bears and trick-or-treat complete fabrication?

Along the lines of Mike G's first reply)

And here I was just giving out crack!.... Say what you will but the same kids keep trying to come back again and again!

(Just kidding for the humor impaired... alternate treats are a great idea!)

Actually, I was forced into giving alternative treats this year -- and they weren't food. Normally, I'm not home on Halloween (there's a convention I regularly go to, but it was the weekend before Halloween this year, due to a hotel conflict) -- so I don't even think of trick-or-treaters. Imagine my horror when they started banging on my door tonight. I had no candy. But then I remembered the drawer into which I have, for the last few years, been tossing the little bottles of bubble stuff I've gotten at the stunningly large number of weddings I've been to in the last three years (all my friends' kids, plus a few second or third marriages). All those little bottles, most with ribbons, flowers, or doves, were what the first two dozen kids got. After that, I turned off the lights and hid. But next year, I'll be ready -- armed with ideas from this thread. (I'm thinking all those mini-salamis at World Market would be unnerving.)

Mhays wrote:Louisa, out of curiousity, are you celebrating Halloween in Alaska? Is what I saw on PBS about Polar Bears and trick-or-treat complete fabrication?

Michele - actually got to celebrate Halloween at home - right here in the Greater Chicagoland Area. On the polar bears - I'm guessing you saw The Polar Bears of Churchill with Ewan McGregor? That's actually up in Manitoba, Canada, but I have no doubt that every year the infamous Churchill polar bears want to eat kids trick or treating. Where I was in Alaska - Sitka, in the SouthEast panhandle - I had to be careful of brown bears while dog-walking - even in the summer with the midnight sun.

Sadly I had no trick-or-treaters this year. I had absinthe candy waiting - just absinthe flavoured - I think.

I guess that was it...I only saw bits (now that I think about it, I turned it off because the celebrity angle became annoying and didn't really pay attention to the location) However, I'd imagine that small children weighted down with sugar and wildlife would make for a challenging combination anywhere.

I do remember being warned about brown bears when taking out the garbage at a fishing lodge in Maine...at least they told lots of stories about them, I never actually saw one.

This is a little off topic, but I have to write about it...Last night my heart was torn out of my chest by an African-American girl, a bit old to be trick-or-treating (maybe thirteen), showing up at our door all alone. She wasn't wearing much of a "costume" (not sure if she was wearing one at all), and she held out the tiniest little clear plastic bag (like, would only hold four ounces of water if you tried to fill it with that). Mrs. riddlemay said to her, "Oh, you can't be trick-or-treating with a bag that small, let me get you a nice shopping bag," and did. And we gave her extra candy. That really seemed to be what the girl was in it for, the candy--and the feeling that she was participating in Halloween, even if she had to do it all alone. But no one should have to go trick-or-treating all alone.