Mmmmmm.... beeeeeer....

As I was walking some opened food merchandise to claims, I passed the "great wall o' beer" in the back room, and something caught my eye: a pumpkin. I had to back up and do a double take. Sure enough, there was a case of beer there that had pumpkins on the box! I decided I must have it. So yesterday, I picked up a 6 pack of Blue Moon's Seasonal "Harvest Moon Pumpkin Ale".

I saved it all day, waiting patiently for prop-building time, when it would be most needed and useful. Now, it's been a while since I've had a beer, so I was really looking forward to this. I LOVED it. It's a good brew, with a hint of pumpkin and spices. Went down really easy and didn't leave a bad aftertaste. I've never even tried any of the fall seasonal beers before, so I have definitely been missing out. It's a good companion to the other tools in my propmaking arsenal. :)

More info on Blue Moon's fine beers: Blue Moon Brewing Co.

Mmmm... chocolate

So, I'd like to start off with saying "THANKS" to PumpkinRot, for posting his blog on the fall editions of Hershey's Kisses and making me want - no, NEED them. I finally bought some today after work, and just had a little taste testing.


The Candy Corn Kisses are pretty good. They taste like a mixture of white chocolate and an almost "butterscotch-y" flavor. I like them, but not as much as I love regular Kisses. They're a nice change though from the usual fare and I hope they stick around for many future fall seasons.


The Caramel Apple Kisses are another story. The chocolate just doesn't really "go" with the fake apple flavor that is somewhat reminiscent of Jolly Rancher's "Green Apple" flavor, mixed with a runny caramel. I didn't care for them at all. I'll probably put them in a candy dish and let the kids eat them all.

I also picked up a bag of Peanut M&Ms in the Halloween colors.... ALWAYS a good thang to have on hand!!!

Hellraiser, and some other stuff...

If you can believe this, I never saw the movie, "Hellraiser". So when I had nothing better to do this past weekend since I was off work, I stopped on the Encore channel that it was playing on and gave it a watch. Interesting movie. Sadistic, dark, strange. I liked it. I missed the first 15 minutes of it, but I got the main idea of the movie as it wore on. I also found it a good source of inspiration for some new props. I really liked the winged demon at the end of the film. I can see one of these gracing my haunt (on a smaller scale for storage, of course).

Photo source: http://www.cenobite.com/index.shtml

I also watched "Mommie Dearest" again. I LOVE that movie. It's sad that it is a true story based on Joan Crawford's daughter, Christine's memoirs, but it is a GREAT movie. I can't tell you how many times I've watched it, and it kind of creeps my kids out that I like it so much and that I recite phrases from it often. On a Halloween-related note, I really sort of thought the scene where she goes nuts over the wire hangers and dirty bathroom was a good spot for some prop ideas. Joan's (Faye Dunaway) face with the night cream on it and her hair pulled back was just frightening and would make a great prop for a hag. :)

"I told you... NO WIRE HANGERS..... EVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

image source: http://www.tvgasm.com

As for the rest of life right now, I'm just sort of drifting with the ebb and flow of sleep and work. I love my job. I don't care for the cattiness of some of my coworkers, but I really don't have to WORK WITH them, so it's all good. I'm training with an intelligent and wonderful woman and she is a lot like me in her work ethic, so she and I will make a good team. My sister also works there on the 3rd shift in a different department, so we get time to catch up on breaks.

I still have no interest in Halloween or doing anything for it, and now the time crunch is here. I'm giving myself until next Monday, and if I have not gotten the itch to get something done, I will just go ahead and start decorating and setting up inside the house. Usually it's all done by now. It will be interesting to see how long it takes me to get it set up from start to finish (the interior) under time constraints.

I'm also struggling with keeping up with emails, forums, and blogging... so if anyone has sent me comments or messages, bear with me. It's taking me a while to get back to everyone. I'm not ignoring people, just have a lot to adjust to and it's gonna take a while.

I think that's about it. Catch y'all later!

Child's view of a cemetery

I recently took my 11-year-old daughter, Taylor, to one of my favorite cemeteries with me to take some pictures. I was going to go alone, but she actually asked me to go, so I figured I'd hand her a digital camera and see what she thinks is photo-worthy. We've done this before with cheap film cameras, but I still haven't gotten those developed. Anyway, we headed to Old Hickory Grove Cemetery in Green Cove Springs. This is what she saw through the lens.




















And this is what I saw... She really got into it. She learned to discard the ones she didn't like or that turned out blurry. She learned to get close-ups and different angles. She basically mimicked me and is a quick learner. Now she wants to go into wildlife photography when she gets older. She did spend a large amount of time taking pictures of flowers, insects and dead rabbit carcasses... :)