Definitely a Chill Developing

Heading out to work the other day I couldn't help but feel the chill of Autumn.

Most of the leaves haven't started turning yet but there's that definite damp cold, not quite crisp, hanging in the air. It's enough to sting your face if you're racing down a hill.

It makes me think of street hockey, light fading sooner and much more quickly, but also sleep and Halloween.

We've moved to a place where getting "trick or treaters" at the house might not happen. I'd wager that it won't happen unless we specifically invite them. There are community events planned but it looks like my kids are going to miss out on what I remember so well about Halloween: Sprinting from house to house with only sugar on my mind.

Maybe It's the Candy

Only hours away from zero-hour, it's finally starting to feel like Halloween.

As a kid, I remember the lead-up to Halloween was often weeks of planning and covertly lighting off firecrackers. The firecracker part is self-explanatory, with the possible exception of bottle rockets -- single stage; three stage rockets are inferior -- that are akin to Silly Putty in the many different uses we came up with, which mostly revolved around firing them out of metal tubes.

But the planning...

That always seemed to me as "carefully considered" like some kind of complicated math problem. We'd consider the best route through the neighbourhood to take, cutting across lawns when needed, take into account what houses gave away full size chocolate bars last year, then timing it out because after a couple hours people took in their jack-o'-lanterns and turned off their lights. Planning the route was key!