Halloween Decor

I bravely went down to the scary basement and rescued the big tub of Halloween decorations, including, much to my delight, the Giant Lighted and Animated Spider Actually Crawls on Web that I had basically forgotten I bought at the Sam's Club clearance sale for like $7 late last fall. Now let us hope it works. The only drawback to this fun annual ritual of making the house all spooooooooky (besides the question which we won't ask: what, exactly, is the point, Felicity, now that your kids are practically grown up and also hardly any kids ever make it up the hill to your house anyway?) is that the weather is unseasonable gorgeously warm here. I just put this vinyl window stick thing of a castle with a witch flying over it which I have treasured beyond all sense for about 11 years now on the same window where I always put it. This is the first year I've ever had to close the window to do it, because usually the windows are closed by now. But it's 80 every day and all the windows in the house are as open as they've been since May. The porch plants are still out on the porch and still flowering happily away; it feels like June or July.

I can't quite get into the pumpkin scarecrow ghost fall mood, and as much as I appreciate being able to put off that thorny question of how I'm going to pay for heat this winter, I'm sick of wearing tank tops and capris and cotton skirts. I want to wear a sweater, damn it. It's October 13 and I'm entitled to wear a nice fatness concealing sweater and my kick ass boots and thick black tights to make my legs look fantastic. But no. It's too damn hot. And I have to thread my scarecrows and spider webs around fuchsias and begonias in full bloom - this just isn't working somehow. I'm baking winter squash, but really all I want is some gazpacho and a salad.