Halloween

The holiday season officially begins the day after Thanksgiving. But somehow, Halloween seems like it may the real start.

I don't mean the fact that Christmas shopping displays will now be popping up. (Actually, these days, signs of Christmas pop up well before October in some stores. I don't entirely joke when I say that one day stores will open the day after Christmas with a display for the next year's Christmas.) But Halloween somehow feels like a start. At least a hint of the coming holiday season. It's the first holiday milestone of fall.

It certainly was a milestone growing up. It was the first point in the calendar to alleviate the school year monotony. We didn't get the day off—in fact, I don't think we got any holidays until Veteran's Day—but we got the afternoon off from school work in elementary school. We'd have a Halloween party.

But the party wasn't the only fun. There were fun decorations picturing black cats and witches. Plus there were jack o'lanterns. Real jack o'lanterns, that is, which were carved out of a pumpkin. None of that paint a face on a pumpkin business! And the carvings were simple faces, and we'd carve with a plain knife. No fancy designs, as one sees sometimes today. No fancy carving sets, either. (I will admit: I admire some of those designs. But somehow, the old chunky faces crafted by a paring knife seem more "Halloween" to me.) My family's jack o'lantern would be lit on Halloween night—and lit with a real candle.

I remember the attachment I felt to that jack o'lantern every year. It would get carved, and lovingly placed on the porch about Halloween. And it would stay there well past Halloween, just like a Christmas tree might linger and linger... But jack o'lanterns—at least in the Seattle area—don't age well on the porch. Decay would set in sooner or later, and slowly the jack o'lantern would start collapsing. (And probably molding, too.) It finally would get dumped in mid to late November.

One year, my family hosted Thanksgiving. When the pumpkin pie was served, my father made a crack that the pumpkin in the pie came from the jack o'lantern that had been scraped off our porch just a few days before.

Then, of course, there was the fun of costumes. Many (most?) years, they were home made by my mother. I was Sylvester or a Sylvester-like cat one year. I think that might have been actually two years, although part of the costume didn't fit the following year. I only remember wearing a commercial costume (I think Casper the Friendly Ghost) maybe once. Today, I wish I'd better appreciated the time and creativity my mother put in back then...

Trick or treating, of course, was a routine. One year, I had a bad cold, and I kicked up a huge fuss when my mother said I should stay home. Eventually, after calling the doctor, she relented...but only if I wore a heavy coat. That probably ruined the costume's effect...but at least I was able to go!

Every year, I'd head out probably just about dark, with a plastic jack o'lantern candy bucket in hand. Back then, we were on standard time by Halloween, and so it would be dark by six. I went out with my mother, and my father would stay behind and hand out candy. I remember at least one year, my mother and I came back to our house while we were making the rounds. My mother stayed well out of sight, and I tried to pass myself off as another kid. One would suspect that my father probably saw through it...and so the only sucker was the one he gave me.

But there was a dark side to trick or treating even then. There was always a risk of getting hit by a car, of course. There was also a risk of bad treats. I don't mean just a candy one hates! But even then, there were stories about razor blades in apples, and poison in candies. One safety tip given in school was that we should have our candy carefully inspected by our parents to make sure the wrapper was 100% intact, and there were no suspicious hypodermic syringe holes to be found.

I know the possibility of poison really scared me... Although, truth be told, my neighborhood was probably pretty safe.

The only scary incident I recall really didn't involve me directly. It was a problem one woman a nearby street had. I remember her as a nice, grandmotherly type. She lived alone. And one year, she was very cautious about opening the door. She made sure it was only a kid there, and that the only adult was several yards away. Apparently, some unsavory types had been prowling her property that night... Taking advantage, one assumes, of a strange night when one might not notice anything out of the ordinary.

I can't remember the last year I trick or treated. Probably the year I was in sixth grade as a guess. It wasn't so much that I'd gotten tired of it—how could a kid get tired of free candy?!?—but I had reached a sad age when my family decreed I was too old for trick or treating.

Microsoft Works for Macintosh

The toughest part of getting my first computer, a Macintosh, was choosing a word processor to buy. The choice was critical—I was a student, and the major practical reason for getting the computer was to write papers for school.

It was not an easy choice. There were seemingly countless word processors, and each appeared to have strengths and weaknesses. I remember reading reviews, and feeling more bewildered than when I started.

Making matters worse, this was an era long before trial downloads, let alone fully free software like today’s LibreOffice. Indeed, Macintosh word processors cost real money back then. So there was the thought: What if I buy the wrong thing and throw money away?

Finally, I decided to buy a copy of Microsoft Works (version 2.0). It was attractively priced for all the features it had. Plus it had gotten good reviews, and was a solid seller. Thus it seemed like the safest “first buy” choice.

Microsoft Works integrated several basic tools (word processor, spreadsheet, database, drawing, and telecommunications) into one program. A lot like AppleWorks (which I discussed a while back). Interestingly, Microsoft Works was apparently originally written by at least one of the AppleWorks creators, and then it was bought by Microsoft later on.

Of course, Microsoft Works was not something power users would like. It was pretty much the basics, and only the basics. One wag cracked that Microsoft Works proved that Bill Gates would lie awake at night worrying that he was giving away something for nothing.

However, Microsoft Works had as much power as many users would ever need.

The word processor—the part that really mattered to me—was more than adequate for my  needs. The only missing feature I could have used was an ability to automate either footnotes or endnotes. However, it wasn’t hard to manually insert a single footnote or two. It wasn’t hard to manually create endnotes. I’d have probably liked automation, of course—it would have appealed to my Inner Sloth—but doing it manually worked just fine.

Microsoft Works' word processor took advantage of the Macintosh way of doing things. So one could have different fonts in a word processor document. One could basic page layout.

Of course, it’s questionable if the capability I had with the Macintosh and Microsoft Works was really necessary for what I did. It was a simpler era back then. Fancy fonts were fun, but monospaced Courier would have been good enough for all the classes I took. For that matter, I probably could have survived using the Jessica Fletcher-style Royal typewriter I’d used in tenth grade.

Although, at the same time, the Macintosh and Microsoft Works did allow me to do things I couldn’t have. I took an arts appreciation class that required me to keep a journal. Most people just used a spiral notebook. I used my new toy computer. The end result was a bit ghastly—I had no sense of good page design. But it was fun—a lot more fun than a spiral notebook—and it wowed my professor. I got my best grade that term from her, and that journal was the only graded assignment.

I also enjoyed writing a couple of papers for French, using the Macintosh’s built-in support for diacritical marks.

Outside of school, I used Microsoft Works’ word processor for a bit of everything. I wrote lots of letters. I wrote some abominable short stories. I did a lot of word processing work for my mother.

Screenshot showing Microsoft Works (Version 2.0) word processor in operation.

Microsoft Works Works’ other modules, however, weren’t quite as useful. I used them sometimes, but not that often. Frankly, I probably could have gotten by without having them, although the spreadsheet did make life a little easier sometimes.

Unfortunately, Works had a dark side. My version had a bug that would sometimes crash Works after saving a word processing document. Fortunately, I never lost a document, but the crashes could be a huge pain. Particularly when they caused System 6 to crash, too. Some nights, it seemed like it would non-stop System crashes.

Eventually, the crashes got so tiresome that I bought a copy of WriteNow. I got a good deal on WriteNow. Plus I’d heard many, many good things about it.

The Macintosh version of Microsoft Works was discontinued a few years later. By that point, the market was probably considerably more competitive. Claris (owned by Apple) was making ClarisWorks, which was much better than Microsoft Works.

Looking back, I can’t honestly say I have much love or sentiment for Microsoft Works. But—apart from the System crashes—it at least did the basics well enough to get by on.

Election fundraising e-mail

Election year always  brings me an incredible flood of e-mail from people or organizations trying to raise money for campaigning.

In a way, it’s strange that I’ve been getting all this e-mail. I am not politically active, past voting. I think what happened is that I signed some on-line petition for some issue or other, and my name was harvested and put up for sale on the list of suckers people who might contribute.

No matter. What matters—to me, at least, as I face my e-mail in box every day—is that they have my address. And they don’t hesitate to use it in hopes of prying loose a few dollars.

All this e-mail gets a bit tiresome. But...at the same time, I have been too lazy to unsubscribe. I also have to admit I’ve been interested (and even entertained at times) by some of the messages and tactics

There seems to be absolutely no limit whom I hear from. None. I am not surprised to get messages from my state governor’s election campaign. But I keep wondering why the campaigns of Cheri Bustos, Julia Brownley, and Raul Ruiz—just to name three—keep e-mailing for money since none of these candidates represent me. And it’s pretty clear in at least some cases that they have the available information to know they don’t represent me. Cheri Bustos' campaign e-mailed last week saying she needed one more donation from my ZIP code. Guess what? My ZIP code—which they correctly quoted—is only about 2,000 miles away from one she represents.

At least, Cheri Bustos can be quite considerate. I got an e-mail saying “I know it’s late...” Not a problem, Ms. Bustos. One advantage of e-mail is that it can be sent when it’s convenient for the sender, and read when it’s convenient for the recipient. So go ahead an e-mail me whenever. I don’t care. I will note, however, that e-mail can be responded to at my convenience. And my convenient moment for responding to a request for money for your campaign will be “never.”

I am also getting e-mail from Hillary Clinton’s campaign. The tone here is often to send money to show support. Often, they have the incentive of offering me a free sticker. (Wasn’t a free sticker incentive worn out back around third grade for most of us?) Sorry, no contribution. But on the brighter side, they will save money since they won’t have to send me a sticker!

Then there the surveys. We need your opinion!!! the senders scream. These surveys seem to have two things in common. First, they seem to me eyes to be biased. I don't think they are not fully neutral, as one would expect if they were actually trying to collect usable data. (For that matter, I’ve wondered if the data is even recorded.) Second thing is that every survey leads to an opportunity to donate. Many have a final question along the lines of “Will you donate $3?” The answers usually are “Yes” and “Yes—but I’ll donate more!” For some reason, “No. I won’t donate” is not usually included, unless it’s tied in with some shaming statement basically suggesting “No—I’m an evil person who wants the bad guys to win!!!”

Another fun tactic is the opportunity to sign a card wishing someone a happy birthday, or thanks for something they did. I note that after signing there is always an opportunity to contribute $25 “or whatever you can afford.” I contribute what I can afford: $0.

I also have noted another theme: my $5 is the only thing standing between victory and defeat in a campaign.

At least the election is nearly here, and soon there will be peace in my In Box.

Or at least there will be more peace. If history from past years repeats, I’ll have a few messages tricking in by late November saying that: “We need to start getting ready for the next election!!!!!”

Next election. Just the thought of the next election makes me wish someone would give a free cyanide capsule instead of a sticker if I donate $1 or more.