BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.

01 Nov 10 - 09:14 AM (#3020676)
Subject: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Georgiansilver

A lady friend of mine had four children, all around eight years old, call at her door last year and shout "Trick or Treat".... She said she had nothing for them and one of them threw an egg at her which made quite a mess on her clothes and her carpet.
This year, the same children came back and shouted "Trick or Treat" and she said "Oh trick... just wait a second" then she fetched a mug of tapwater and threw it over them.... is that called revenge???

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01 Nov 10 - 09:57 AM (#3020701)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: gnu

Depends on what the kids do next. Might have been a stupid move.

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01 Nov 10 - 10:05 AM (#3020710)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: EBarnacle

In today's litigious society, she may have just bought herself a lawsuit. Despite the court's ruling about the 4 year old, children are not considered responsible. Adults are.

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01 Nov 10 - 07:09 PM (#3021182)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: bubblyrat

Yes indeed ; they are responsible for the actions of their children,which includes the unwelcome (in many cases) attention paid by said children to other (often elderly & frightened) peoples' homes during this unpleasant and rather disturbing annual event.In my opinion,any child who goes around throwing eggs at people for NOT giving them money or candy or whatever should be taken into care,as their parents obviously have no control over them.

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01 Nov 10 - 07:18 PM (#3021191)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: olddude

That is why we have police, Ya call them you see, but you do this to some kid .. and you get the jail time and rightfully so ... Adults are suppose to know better ...

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01 Nov 10 - 07:44 PM (#3021207)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: gnu

Call the police? When they do show up, maybe, they can't do shit. Only way is to catch the perps, of any age, on video. Video systems are cheap now, but installing them is not cheap.

I was thinking of a paintball gun. Now, all I have is deicer and various cleaner sprays for the nastier little pricks.

Had my tomatoes ravaged by glue sniffers who have found a "blind spot" behind my garage. Tore up a few garden stakes. Not much damage but it still pisses me off. Love to smoke them pricks with some bright orange pait balls... but, will I get sued?

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01 Nov 10 - 08:05 PM (#3021220)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Tig

I was struck by a thought (unusual I know :-}). We didn't have any trick or treaters last night as we have very few children round us now but who else thinks the habit of celebrating Halloween in the UK is partly the fact that the Elfin Safety has put such a kibosh on us celebrating Bonfire Night?

Way in the dim and distant past when I was much younger we DID have a candle lantern for Halloween, made out of a turnip or mangleworzle (similar but larger and used to feed cattle). This was then saved so we could light our sparklers from it on Bonfire Night. It was to keep the goulies and ghosties away from us whilst we slept in true Celtic tradition.

The 4th November was Mischief Night which was stuff like knocking on doors and running away or hiding dustbin lids. No dangerous antics and DEFINATELY no wasting of food or frightening old people. Bonfires were well guarded on Mischief Night as wood from someone elses bonfire was fair game - but you never took more than a few bits.

This was then followed by Bonfire Night. A great local time where everyone joined in. We had a big garden with spare land and usually 'hosted' the fire - but everyone brought food and fireworks. We were allowed to light sparklers (from our lantern) and also had jumping jacks (now illegal) to scare our friends. It was an accepted fact the adults lit the fireworks and I can't remember anything that would have been classed as a 'severe' accident.

Nowadays we are herded into 'Organised' firework displays and fires. Strange - the only time I know that someone got hurt was when a firework at one of these went astray and Katy got burnt. There's no anticipation in collecting wood for your fire, keeping it dry, being taken to the shop to CHOOSE your fireworks individually (a Catherine Wheel took up most of my allowance one year!)and then waiting for the fire to catch after it was lit at twilight.

Where have we gone wrong?

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01 Nov 10 - 08:12 PM (#3021221)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Gurney

The little bitch who lived next door threw an egg at my brick house even though we had given her sweets. Didn't see it until next morning, and the stain is permanent.
Anyone know how to remove 12yo albumen?
Short of blowing up the Sistene Chapel?

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01 Nov 10 - 08:24 PM (#3021225)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Rapparee

Try scrubbing it with dry sand.

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01 Nov 10 - 08:33 PM (#3021231)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: dick greenhaus

Some years back, a friend of mine, who was a member of the Police Auxiliary in his town, explained to me how to deal with egg-carrying adolescents. "Just pat them down, thoroughly"

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02 Nov 10 - 04:07 AM (#3021381)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Slag

California is a screwy state but not about all things. If I remember right, it is a crime to egg someone or their property, a felony. They upped the ante a little. And gnu! I hope you all was just a kidding. Here it is considered a felonous assult to shoot someone unknowing with a paintball gun. We have had some very serious occurences in both departments.

Getting the goods on video is probably the best remedy as if the police aren't busy with a doughnut break then they are probably on a higher priority case than your little egg-toss fracus. Set up a couple of phoney cameras to serve as a warning to the little dears and a couple of real cameras well hidden. That way you can get them trying to steal or destroy the phoney cameras. A couple of feet of inexpensive coax going through a hole in the wall is a nice touch. Put a big knot in the end so they cannot easily jerk it out.

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02 Nov 10 - 05:36 AM (#3021414)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,CrazyEddie

how to deal with egg-carrying adolescents. "Just pat them down, thoroughly"

I am not that crazy!
Way to end up on a sex-offenders register.

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02 Nov 10 - 06:41 AM (#3021446)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,Eliza

Just to balance up the picture a bit, in this tiny Norfolk, UK village, we lit a pumpkin lantern outside the door, and had a stream of absolutely delightful children, some even teenagers, all in costumes. I gave them small sweets and they were polite and charming. Their parents hovered nearby on the pavement, just to keep an eye on things. Nobody demanded anything and we were so amused to see their witches and wizards outfits. The best was a tiny little lad of about three dressed as a ghost, but so shy he hid behind his sister. It all stems from community spirit and joint responsibility for all our children.

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02 Nov 10 - 06:52 AM (#3021452)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: MGM·Lion

··· and my village is in Cambridgeshire, which borders Norfolk. We left the porch-light on, & had delightfully polite visitors who tried on no disagreeable tricks, and accepted lollipops with utmost courtesy despite their grotesque masks. One of them raised his mask to reveal, & remind us, that he was a neighbour's foster child who had attended our wedding party a few months ago!

~Michael~

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02 Nov 10 - 09:41 AM (#3021553)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Richard Bridge

Be careful of the Data Protection Act is you install video.

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02 Nov 10 - 01:22 PM (#3021754)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,Eliza

MtheGM, do you think perhaps that village life is one of the best ways to promote a sense of community among a population? If one is anonymous in a large city, nobody cares or tries to intervene when very bad behaviour occurs. I wonder if there is an optimum number of inhabitants for a successfully functioning society? In prehistoric times, hunter-gatherer groups were tiny, and huge populations unknown. Here, we ALL feel responsible for the children, and for the vulnerably old. Egg throwing just wouldn't be tolerated for one second.

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02 Nov 10 - 01:39 PM (#3021779)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: MGM·Lion

Eliza ~ An interesting question. I am now a villager, but am a Londoner by origin & have never entirely warmed to village life ~~ I sometimes have fantasies of lifting up my nice house in a Kansas-style twister [see Wizard Of Oz!] & depositing it on the edge of Hampstead Heath...

Not sure how I would answer your question. Trick·or·Treat is of course an American custom that has only comparatively recently caught on here, so I have no recollections of it in a city context for comparison purposes. I shall ponder...

Best regards

~Michael~

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02 Nov 10 - 02:05 PM (#3021803)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,Eliza

Michael, during the sixties I lived up in Scotland, and they have always had trick-or-treat at Hallowe'en, but they call it 'guising'. One blackens the face, no particular costume, and it's expected that the caller performs a little song or turn for some sweets etc. I think this was also done for centuries in Ireland, and the Irish emigrants during the Famine took it to USA. I think also it has its origins in the old Celtic 'samain' which is/was celebrated at this time. I do love all these traditions! I must say I'd hate to live near London, you're obviously a 'town mouse' and I'm a 'country mouse'!

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02 Nov 10 - 02:12 PM (#3021810)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: bobad

From Wikipedia:

The practice of dressing up in costumes and begging door to door for treats on holidays dates back to the Middle Ages and includes Christmas wassailing. Trick-or-treating resembles the late medieval practice of souling, when poor folk would go door to door on Hallowmas (November 1), receiving food in return for prayers for the dead on All Souls Day (November 2). It originated in Ireland and Britain,[1] although similar practices for the souls of the dead were found as far south as Italy.[3] Shakespeare mentions the practice in his comedy The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1593), when Speed accuses his master of "puling [whimpering or whining] like a beggar at Hallowmas."[4] The custom of wearing costumes and masks at Halloween goes back to Celtic traditions of attempting to copy the evil spirits or placate them, in Scotland for instance where the dead were impersonated by young men with masked, veiled or blackened faces, dressed in white.[5][6]

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02 Nov 10 - 02:46 PM (#3021835)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,Eliza

How fascinating that all these things have such ancient origins! Thank you Bobad. All the more reason I feel to encourage their continuance, even in our modern society. We perhaps have an inborn 'memory' of these traditions, it would be a shame if they died out entirely. For instance, having a bonfire in the night and congregating round it always feels instinctive to me, a primitive response. And wearing fancy dress or a mask makes a person really become 'someone else' and not just on the surface. I wonder if our modern 'civilised' ways are only a thin veneer over our more primitive selves?

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02 Nov 10 - 03:04 PM (#3021850)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: VirginiaTam

She should have repaid them in really old eggs, wrapped in pretty tissue paper and thrown down quite hard into their bags or buckets...

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02 Nov 10 - 05:03 PM (#3021974)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Slag

I'm with you Guest Eliza, that's how I remember Hallowe'en both as a wee one and as a young adult. I regret some of the idiotic things I did as a teenager. Most of us grow up but at what cost. At any rate... I also share you village community. Such was my "neighborhood". Kids would roam into out out of the freindly neighbors houses. All were known to each other and come trick or treat it was a game to guess who was who and who belonged to who. Precious memories.

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03 Nov 10 - 01:35 PM (#3022653)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: jonm

Raw Brussels sprouts coated in chocolate and wrapped in foil.... also chillies ditto.

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03 Nov 10 - 02:04 PM (#3022668)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Little Hawk

It happens now and then in life that a child or an adult will briefly treat you in an insensitive and offensive...but essentially rather trivial fashion.

What is the best remedy?

Revenge? No.

Suing them? No.

Assaulting them? No.

Doing something similar to them as what they did to you? No.

Obsessing over it and running it around in your mind for days or weeks or even months afterward? No.

Complaining to all your friends about it? No.

Calling the police? No.

Raising hell about it with whoever will listen? No.

The best remedy for it is to get on with the rest of your life right now, concentrate on something that you enjoy instead and forget about the kid who threw an egg on Hallowe'en.

Life will never be perfect (nor will other people), and if you expect it to be perfect and can't accept it when it isn't...you'll almost never be happy. Don't have any expectations at all. Just keep moving forward in life and enjoying it each step at a time. It no longer matters what happened on Hallowe'en, and if you think it does you're just mired in the past and running it around in your head over and over, and that causes you stress. The past is gone, you can't change it, and all your opportunities for happiness are right now: in the present. And they always will be.

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04 Nov 10 - 05:18 AM (#3023190)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,Patsy

A few years ago I had quite a funny Halloween experience, a group of tiny little girls decided to go on their first Trick or Treat and called at my house with their bag ready to add the yummy treats. Anyway for a change I requested a trick. They huddled in a little group to discuss this turn of events and slowly walked back downcast to my door and said 'but we haven't got anything planned' and their chins started to quiver. And I said don't worry I will give you some treats to add to your bag and there stood 6 relieved looking little girls that said, 'Thank you very much.'

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04 Nov 10 - 09:01 AM (#3023309)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Bonzo3legs

Fortunately we only had nice children come to our door on the night with a parent nearby, so no problems this year.

We have CCTV so any egg throwers will be recorded!

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04 Nov 10 - 09:29 AM (#3023335)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler

I remember the Charlie Brown from Peanuts always ended up with a stone instead of a sweet. Presumably this was the trick. Would it be against Health and safety today?

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04 Nov 10 - 09:48 AM (#3023346)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: SINSULL

An egg throwing in California cost a teenager his life - the vehicle owner returned with a gun.

In my neighborhood, the etiquette is to put on your proch light if you have treats. I had somewhere between 60 and 100 visitors before I turned out the light and no one else came or "tricked" me. Egg throwing is such a waste of good food when too many people including children go hungry here in Maine. I saw no egg throwing this year. Maybe it has sunk in.

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04 Nov 10 - 12:02 PM (#3023444)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: GUEST,Neil D

An egg throwing in California cost a teenager his life - the vehicle owner returned with a gun.


Something similar happened near where I live. Near the town of Mt. Eaton, Ohio the Amish kids are known to hide in a field near St Rt 241 and throw rotten tomatoes at the "English" as they drive by in their cars. One such tomato hit a Trans Am owned by a hot-headed young man who pulled off the rode and fired a pistol indiscriminately into the field, killing one of the youths.

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05 Nov 10 - 06:08 PM (#3024627)
Subject: RE: BS: Trick or Treat. the revenge.
From: paula t

We have a great system which we started in our village about 10 years ago. It is made public who is willing to have trick or treaters call.A list is collated, (usually in the pub).This started when a friend organised a halloween party for the village children and some of the parents volunteered to dress up and take groups of children round to an agreed list of houses. A great time was had by all, the houses visited had all been decorated and many of the adults waiting for the trick or treaters dressed up too.
Everyone enjoyed it so much that this is now a tradition and the list of people willing to have their doors knocked on has grown.Our children are now much older and don't have a halloween party anymore - but many still go round in their groups because they now escort the young children round "the route".We are very lucky in that we have well behaved, polite young people who don't knock on doors where they are not expected. Many of the old people in the village join in and enjoy being visited by this lovely, lively bunch who always have time to chat, say thank you and wouldn't dream of upsetting anyone.I'm proud of them.
Can't see this working in most places though!

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