Um, trick?

Last night while I was waiting for Gordon to come home with our Hallowe'en sushi, Sophie started barking at a car outside. I figured it was just hubby out there, until I heard loud knocking at the porch door. Uh oh! That's not sushi.

"TRICK OR TREAT!"

Turns out there were three adorable kids in costume there, looking for treats. Treats I didn't have. Ooops!

Because we live out in the boonies on a farm with a veeeery long laneway, and because no kids showed up last year, we didn't bother buying any goodies this year! So I had zip, nada, nothing for the poor children. But I told them to wait, and managed to find a loonie (dollar coin) for each of them, so that they could go buy some chocolate on us. I decided against giving them each a healthy granola bar.

Unlike my Mum (who, after I left home, would barricade herself in a darkened house on Hallowe'en, ignoring the doorbell), I actually enjoy Hallowe'en and giving out candy to kids, so it was nice to see these three. They were obviously determined, intrepid little trick-or-treaters; not only did their parent drive them down our long dark laneway to our not-very-well-lit house, but they managed to see that our main door is unuseable right now (because the deck is ripped up and a new rock foundation is being built under that part of the house), read the sign telling them to go to the porch door, find it, enter the darkened porch, locate the kitchen door, and knock.

Alas, my poor cat Julius (who is not allowed outside* because he WILL get eaten by a fisher) was out on the porch at the time (shut in.) When I went to the kitchen door, I opened it to three cute kids and one totally freaked-out cat, who streaked past me in an orange blur to the safety of his chair. No doubt Julius thought that the end of the world had arrived. One of the kids was dressed as a devil, after all.

After giving the kids their payola, I wished them a Happy Hallowe'en and bid them a good night. Next year I'll make sure we have a little chocolate on hand. In fact, this is all completely excellent, because we will now always have an excuse to buy at least a small amount of Hallowe'en candy! I really miss those chocolatey leftovers.




*The cats have an outdoor "kitty palace" that we bought from this place, and highly recommend.

PS: Not only do we have fishers around here, but a young black bear has been sighted several times recently in this area, and we also have the odd wolf, an occasional moose, and of course a bazillion coyotes. I'm not too worried about the bear or a moose eating the cats, but the others would quite enjoy a feline snack.

PPS: The snow is all melted now! The last of it disappeared during the night. Hooray!