This week has been a bear. I apologize for the radio silence! I’m on the road now, for a little R&R with some friends, and had to login quickly to say Happy Halloween. I’m actually in Salem, MA and hope to see lots of witches (and Sarah Palin impersonators)(wait, what’s the difference, again?) roaming the streets tonight. Hope you have something fun planned – if you’re looking for a last-minute tip, check out Speakeasy DC’s ‘Ween in the Woods, and tell Amy (the lady in charge) that I sent ya. Otherwise, type to you again next week, post-election, as my life resumes its normal shape. (And my weekly events round-ups return – thanks to everyone for your emails and suggestions!)
P.S. A newcomer to DC emailed me to ask for recommended painting and/or advanced drawing classes. Help me out, gentle readers!
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Back when I worked for the airline, my husband, a few work friends – one of whom is a Lugosi-phile/vampiric matinee monster lover – and I non-revved up to Salem for Halloween. We figured it’d be like visiting Rome at Christmas or something. After travel and getting costumed and such, it was after 9 before we got into downtown. Parking was a bear and we ended up walking about a mile to get into the center of the festivities. No biggie.
The festivities, we found, turned out to be large wandering clumps of drunk Bostonians in relatively pedestrian costumes. Not much outside the realm of Party City. Every pub we tried to check out was so packed they were bouncing people back. And when we found our way to the witch museum, they were closing – at like 10 on Halloween. 10! On Halloween! We ran across at least 5 fist-fights in progress or beginning and one near-miss. And apparently there was a shooting the night we were there, too.
Not sure what exactly we were expecting. Maybe some centerpiece event like a parade or a ritual or scattered street performances – and the anti-Halloween zealots don’t count – at least the museum staying open past 10PM! Instead it was an overlarge, unfocused angry frat party. We can say we’ve done Salem on Halloween; can’t say it did anything for us. I really hated being let down. I sincerely hope your experience was different.
Letty: it was definitely a mob scene, but we left early enough, I think, to avoid anything “untowards,” and were able to just enjoy good people-watching….fun to see so many people who put so much thought/effort into their costumes!
I’m seriously relieved you guys enjoyed it!