Halloweeny

ABOUT TIME: It's a good thing Halloween was today, because I don't think this moldy ol' jack-o'-lantern of CJ's could take even one more day without entirely caving in on itself.

Frankly, I'm surprised this pumpkin aged so gracelessly. We went and plucked it right out of the farmer's field, for Pete's sake. Hate to think we would have been better off with a pummy from Albertsons or some such store.

TRUTH BE TOLD: We did almost ZERO honest-to-goodness school work today. Sure, the kids read, and yeah, Christian and I answered the dozens of questions that pop up during the course of a normal day, but most of today was getting ready for Halloween (costume tune ups and quick fixes) and getting ready for an appraiser (for our re-fi). I rather like staging the place. It's nice to see the house looking its best. Three days from now, it will be back to having piles on every counter and a thin layer of dog hair everywhere, I s'pose.

PLANT ONE ON: One of our errands today involved hitting Swanson's, a local nursery/garden center, to get some houseplants for the staging. While there, we got to check out what was left of their Halloween hay maze. I have to admit, I was a bit surprised to see they were dismantling it today - ON Halloween. Could they not wait one more day? Any who, the kids still enjoyed it.

DON WE NOW: About 3:30, the kids worked their way into their costumes so we could go trick or treat the Magnolia business district at 4 p.m. Here they are ready to collect buckets full of candy ...

CJ is a controller for a classic Nintendo Entertainment System (NES).

Annabelle is, quite obviously, Nyan Cat. While I didn't expect everyone - or even most people - to recognize her, I didn't expect so many people to think she was a mouse with a Pop Tart. ;) The people who did get Nyan Cat thought it was The Best, though, so those few and far between people were gratifying. The upside to this - if you ever want a quick, easy and cheap Halloween costume, everyone recognizes and loves the novelty of a Pop Tart.

FLY BY: All day, my eyes were on the skies, looking at cloud coverage and wondering what the weather would be like right after dinner tonight. Was I worried about wet trick or treaters? Not a bit! What I was fretting over is whether or not we'd be able to see the stars about 6:47 p.m., when the International Space Station (ISS) would be zooming over Seattle skies.

Earlier today via Twitter, I learned about a service (Twisst ISS alerts) where you can register and then it sends you Tweets letting you know when the ISS will be visible in your neck of the woods. I signed up at midday and late afternoon I got a Tweet letting me know the ISS should be visible in the Northwest sky at 6:47 p.m. When the skies started clearing at 5 p.m., we got sure excited. At 6:30 we left home for the top of our hill. We decided that a great place to park would be by the house where a local Realtor turns his whole front yard into a pumpkin patch. Turns out it was a good call.

We parked about 6:44 and started scanning the skies. Despite light pollution, we saw dozens of stars and so I was hopeful that we'd get lucky. The appointed time - 6:47 came and went - and I started to doubt the accuracy of the alert. I thought, "Hmm, maybe that was an East Coast time or something. ..."

Just about then, Christian announced, "There it is!" He was pointing to the WNW and sure enough, it was super easy to spot. Brighter than any of the stars in tonight's sky and moving at a good clip, we watched the ISS make its way from west to east. The kids were seriously jumping up and down excited! :) I suggested they go trick or treating at the pumpkin place right away, and tell the homeowner that this very minute the ISS was flying over his house. The kids excitedly rapped on the man's door and when he opened it, instead of saying "Trick or treat!" they yelled, "Look! The ISS is flying over your house RIGHT NOW!!!!" :)

Fortunately, that got his attention. :) He came out onto his porch spotted the space station and started asking questions. Excellent! He asked if the ISS flies over his house every night (no), how we knew it would be there tonight (the magical Internets), and why it glowed like a star (the sun reflecting off it, yes, even at night). He was completely wowed and so were we. The kids got lots of candy from him. :) The best part was, while we were leaving and he was heading back into his house, we heard him declare, "That was SO COOL!" And then as we got in the car, I saw him pop his head back outside, scan the skies, clearly hoping to catch another glimpse of the ISS. :)

Best Halloween ever. :)