Ok, so my son’s babysitter and he carved a pumpkin LAST Friday because she is away this Friday.  So, we have a candle-less jack o’lantern in the house.  To me, it looked like a fruit that was poised to rot if left out.  (Maybe you are getting the idea that I hate Halloween.)  What am I to do with a carved-up piece of fruit that will attract every manner of vermin and insect into my kitchen?  Throw it out?  An excellent idea, except that would not be a good thing in my son’s eyes.  So, I put it in the refrigerator, where one puts stuff that would rot if left out.

My partner comes home and sees the pumpkin in the refrigerator and thinks I am an alien who came fully sprung from a pod and never experienced Halloween or any other quaint Americanism that our society holds dear.  She thinks it is even a little charming.  Then she realizes that I grew up in NYC and I am (allegedly) a non-pod person, so now she thinks I am crazy and a little ooky.

People dressing up in scary clothes, eating candy that rots out teeth, carving rotting fruit.  What kind of holiday is this anyway?