The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:
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Notes -
Halloween went well. I have two little kids, the older one picked out the costumes for both this year.
It did rain during Halloween, but I think this had an interesting side effect of resetting Halloween expectations. For the previous two years people had been putting their candy out on tables in their driveway, cuz COVID. Well with the rain no one wanted to do that, so it was back to walking up to houses.
As a parent I'd prefer my kids to have to deal with some awkward social situations rather than get a boatload more candy.
I typically set up shop at the end of my driveway and refuse to give anyone candy until they perform the ritual threat. If there is precipitation, I'll open the garage and sit just inside. I prefer this to answering my door repeatedly, and this way I can talk to the adults who stick to the sidewalk while sending their children up to doorsteps. It's not a huge time commitment since trick-or-treating generally runs from 6pm to 8pm where I live, and we do get a couple hundred visitors in that span so I would be answering my door every few moments anyway.
This year there were a shockingly large number who had forgotten the ritual threat. "Do you have something to say to me?" was met with "Happy Halloween?" and "Please?" almost as often as "Trick or treat!" The habit of just-walk-up-and-take-candy set in remarkably quickly with some of these kids, I guess is what I'm saying. I assume this is a weird COVID-19 thing but maybe not.
Do you know the history of the saying?
There appear to be similar ritual threats in the (antiquated now) Slavic tradition of kolyadovanie.
They weren't ritualistic at all. Getting a load of snow down the chimney or finding your door blocked by firewood in the morning were legitimate outcomes of not providing the treats just 150 years ago.
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