Neal Stephenson in Toronto, Halloween candy survey

I had no idea that Neal Stephenson writes out his books by hand using a fountain pen. I think my hand would fall off after just a few paragraphs. Anyway, I have a post about the event up on Inkygirl, for those interested.

I'm excited about tonight. It's the first time I'll be handing out candy at Halloween at my own house since I moved to Toronto over 20 years ago. I've put up some Halloween decorations, and I'm stressing out about running out of Halloween candy before the end of the night. Sure, my neighbors said we don't tend to get many trick-or-treaters because of our location, but what if there's a sudden surge of trick-or-treaters this year?



What if some little toddler dressed up in an oversized Winnie the Pooh costume ends up on my doorstep after I've handed out the last chocolate bar?!? I've been looking over my Halloween stash and doing calculations in my head, trying to figure out how many chocolate bars I should hand out to each child to minimize the chances that I'll be left with a pile of candy at the end of the night but also avoid running out too early.



And that brings me to my Halloween survey. What are you planning to hand out tonight? How much candy do you give to each child? Or are you planning to turn off the lights and just pretend you're not home? Will you be at a Halloween party instead? Or just ignoring the event altogether?

I'll resume my OVFF report soon.

Halloween Impending

Will Write For Chocolate has been updated; click image above to see a bigger version. Halloween's in a couple of weeks! I'm excited because this is the first year that Jeff and I will be home to hand out candies. I asked my neighbour how many kids usually come by, and she said not very many -- maybe 15-20.

I'm shocked. Where are all the kids?? Part of the problem is that there is no sidewalk on the main road near us, so that it's more of a hassle for parents and kids to get to our side of the street.

I don't care if we only get 20 kids. That'll just mean we can make their treats MEGA-treats instead, right? And I finally get to use all the very silly Halloween prop stuff I've been accumulating since we moved here! The neighbours are going to think I'm crazy, I'm sure...