Friday, October 31, 2014

Demons are a Ghoul's Best Friend

Thought for the day:  Halloween was confusing. All my life, my parents said, "Never take candy from strangers." And then they dressed me up and said, "Go beg for it." I didn't know what to do! I'd knock on people's doors, and go, "Trick or treat!" "No, thank you."  [Rita Rudner]

[Morguefile]
Halloween gives us a good excuse to be lazy put off some of that pesky housecleaning. After all, dust bunnies and cobwebs help us create the proper atmosphere, dontcha think? The perfect place for the kiddies to play hide and shriek. An eerie kinda place to sit back and sip a nice cold Blood Lite...

Okay, I'll stop. (Sorry. Just kidding!)

Do zombies eat popcorn with their fingers? Nope. They always eat the fingers separately.


[Morguefile]

Okay, I'm not one to lose my head over Halloween decorations, (at least, not any more...) but no bones about it... Happy Halloween, y'all!!!

Didja check the weather forecast and today's horrorscope to see what kind of evening might be in store for you? Gonna have fettucini a-fraid-o and a nice bottle of boooze for dinner? Or maybe some nice fried poultry-geist?

Okay, I'll stop now. Really.

But in honor of Halloween, we've gotta talk about something scary...

[Morguefile]
It was a dark and dreary night...

except for the moon. There has to be a big full, pizza pie in the sky kinda moon...

maybe coyotes howling...

[Morguefile]







and a bunch of hungry buzzards...

No, wait! Forget the buzzards. At my age, the idea of impatient buzzards hanging around is entirely too scary.

But how about... a doll? A haunted doll?

[wikipedia]


Now, I'm not talking about Chucky, although those movies did scare the bejeezus out of me. Smarticus even claimed I turned into that creepy doll at the stroke of midnight one Valentine's Day, when, in a deep gravelly voice, I oh-so-sweetly suggested...
I WANT CHOCOLATE!!!
But that, of course, was a gross exaggeration. (Hey! I only did it for comic effect. By the way, it worked. I got my chocolate...)

[wikipedia]

Anyhow, the doll I'm talking about is named Robert. Robert the Doll. (Makes sense...)

Claimed by some to be the creepiest toy in America, the doll was given to Robert Eugene Otto, a well-known Key West artist, in 1906, when he was just a young boy. It was a gift from his nanny shortly after she became his ex-nanny. His voodoo-practicing ex-nanny. The doll she made for the little boy bore a striking resemblance to him, and even had human hair stitched onto its head... hair which had come from the boy's head.

Almost from the start, the doll was... different. The boy had conversations with it... two-way conversations. The family heard creepy giggles. Tiny feet scampering in the night. Schoolchildren claimed to see it move from window to window... watching them as they walked past. Things disappeared, got broken, got moved. And always, the boy claimed, Robert did it. .

Even as an adult, Otto kept the doll nearby, and never painted without Robert sitting beside him. After he got married, he built Robert his own special room in the attic. His wife was spooked by the giggles, sounds of scampering feet, eerie events, and other sounds coming from the attic, and after Otto's death, she moved out, and left the doll behind in the attic, where he continued to spook tenants who rented the house.

Now? Robert resides behind glass in the Fort East Martello Museum in Key West, Florida, where he continues to freak people out, who claim the doll changes expressions. A sign hanging beside him instructs people to only take pictures with Robert's permission. He allegedly gives a little nod to signal his approval. Failure to ask could lead to... a voodoo curse of some kind. I kid you not...



As creepy as that doll is, I can think of something even scarier. Early polls are showing a strong possibility that both our gubernatorial and senatorial races may be so close, run-off elections will be required. Know what that means? Enduring TWO MORE MONTHS of toxic political mud-slinging ads and robo-calls.
                      OH, NOOOOOO!!!!!!!
                                                   
                                                          Now THAT'S scary.

Okay, just one more. Know where the goblin threw the football? Over the ghoul line! Y'all have a de-fright-fully boooootiful Halloween.

                  Until next time, take care of yourselves. And each other.

89 comments:

  1. Enjoyable post, Susan! Our local forecast for Friday night is darkness. I hope all the trick-or-treaters are wearing light colors and carrying flashlights. Have a fun evening!

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    1. Thanks, dude! I'm glad ya liked it. Gonna be dark here, too, and that's good, because Smarticus and I always wear matching glow-in-the-dark skeleton tee shirts. After wearing them every year for more than twenty years, they still glow verrrry brightly in the dark. Hmmm, that in itself could be kinda scary...

      You have fun, too!

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  2. Our local kids are coming around on the 1st Nov. Some of them are away and can't be here for Halloween itself. I shall be putting the bejeezus up them anyway.

    The weirdest doll ever must be Joe Carstairs' doll 'Lord Tod Madely' (?). Carstairs was a wealthy woman, and had everything custom made for him; he even had his own working pistol. He's worth looking-up on Wiki.

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    1. Thanks for the tip on the weirdest doll ever; I'll definitely check it out.

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  3. Have a spooky Halloween.
    I am so sick of the elections ! I vote early with my mail in ballot but in reality my vote never counts. But I vote.
    I don't have any little ones coming by. I live out in the country and trying to walk up my driveway doesn't make it worth it even if they did.

    cheers, parsnip

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    1. I went to the bank and grocery store today... that was enough spookiness for me. Driving on Atlanta roads isn't for the faint of heart.

      We did early voting, too. Now that we've already cast our ballots, it's too bad we can't opt out of those crummy political ads. And to think we might have to put up with them for two more months yet. ARRRRRGH!

      Cheers back atcha.

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  4. I do hope that Gary who I always considered the pun master sees this post. I am wincing - and wishing all those who celebrate a very Happy Halloween - with plenty of treats and no tricks.

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    1. You're right; Gary really is the pun master. I haven't heard from him on Blogger for quite a while. Just on Facebook. I guess I'd better check his blog and see if he's up and running again, now that he's settled into his new place.

      Here's wishing you lots of treats, too, and a terrific weekend.

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  5. Hi Susan - this is great .. and an enjoyable scary read ... and Robert - what an amazing 'doll' .. very eery, spooky, ghoulish indeed. Elections don't talk about them .. we're having mini ones too and mini flare-ups .. but they rule us .. poor us. Cheers Hilary

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    1. Hi-ya, Hilary. Politics can be a lot scarier than any old doll. (Said I while safely living hundreds of miles away from creepy Robert's home in Key West...)

      Cheers!

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  6. I so agree about the mixed messages to children - as you may know, I worked in Child Protection, so know too much about the terrible things that can happen to children. Parties, apple-bobbing, ghost stories around the fire - I love those. But bullying total strangers for sweets - oh no!

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    1. My parents didn't allow me to go trick-or-treating, and they never gave out candy, either. When I was a child, that is. Later on, when they were in their "golden years", they loved to put up Halloween decorations and hand out candy to all the children. I don't know if they were originally opposed to trick-or-treating because of that whole "begging" aspect, or if they simply couldn't afford to buy candy back then.

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  7. Okay Susan, that is a scary doll, what was wrong with his parents letting him keep the doll... Happy Halloween to you and your hubby too... :)

    Valentina is going out a black kitty, mostly she is excited to give out candy this year :)

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    1. I dunno. Maybe his parents were afraid of the nanny they'd fired.

      I hope Valentina is gonna have a nice bright flashlight so everyone can see that cute little kitty in the dark. And a very Happy Halloween to you, too!

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  8. That Otto had a wife and she stayed with him and Robert till her husband's demise is spooky itself. That had to be the strangest ménage a tois ever.

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    1. Good point. The wife must have been an itsy bitsy bit strange, too.

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  9. Happy halloween and enjoy a possible 2 more months of that campaign crap, uggg. My ocd would make me clean, so no lazy here i fear

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    1. Happy Halloween to you, too. Yeah, two more months.UGH.

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  10. That was a creepy doll story indeed...Happy Chocolate Day .. um .. I mean Halloween.

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    1. Happy Chocolate Day to you, too. Um, wait a minute! Isn't EVERY day chocolate day? (It should be!)

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  11. Interesting story! I bet that doll could fetch a pretty penny on ebay - I hear doll collectors LOVE dolls that are haunted.

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    1. Thanks! Eeeeeps, you mean there are MORE haunted dolls out there??? (I'll have to check that out...)

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  12. I think all dolls are creepy so Robert will no doubt live in my nightmares. Yikes!!!
    Happy Halloween, Susan! :)

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    1. Judging by your books, I kinda figured you had a "thing" for Halloween, or at least for scary stuff in general. Hey, at least Robert hasn't bitten anyone on the neck! (As far as we knoooooow...)

      Happy Halloween to you, too, Julie.

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  13. Okay, Robert the Doll was a new one on me and that is totally creepy, ha ha. Thanks for giving me more nightmare fodder, Susan!

    Happy Halloween!

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    1. Yeah, that doll is definitely creepy. I wouldn't want to come across him in a nightmare... (Um... you're welcome...? HA!)

      Happy Halloween to you, too.

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  14. creepy dolls. Now I'll have to put on all the lights in the house. And then I'll see the cobwebs. Happy Halloween. Hope your weekend is all treats and no tricks

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  15. I loved the creepy/scary read Susan :) Happy Halloween!!

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    1. Thanks. Happy Halloween to you, too. That's one more day closer to Christmas for you... and oh yeah... to your wedding !

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  16. Okay, now I'm officially creeped out! Great story!

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    1. HA! You creeped out? Naaaah. (Okay, maybe just a little...) But it is a cool story.

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  17. Creepy story. I was engrossed reading it. I didn't hear aboyt Robert doll until you told. Happy Halloween.

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    1. I'd never heard of Robert the doll, either, until I read an article about him a couple months ago. Seemed like the perfect tale to share for Halloween.

      Happy Halloween!

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  18. Cool story and the info on Robert was very interesting, my only concern is if you got his permission to share this..

    Happy Halloween

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  19. 'Robert The Doll' doesn't creep me out in the least, because for many years I worked nights in what must surely be one of the most haunted buildings in America.

    I don't work there anymore, but tonight I do have to work, in a different building, but... it IS the "graveyard shift".

    Please pray... (or party)... for me.

    ~ D-FensDogg
    'Loyal American UNDERGROUND'...
    but "dying" to dig up and come out...
    for air.

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    1. Hmmm, I'd be curious to hear more about that "most haunted" building.

      HA! Yeah, the graveyard shift. How appropriate.

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  20. No way would I want to visit Robert the Doll.
    Happy Howl-o-Ween :)

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    1. Howl-o-ween...good one! (Hope you HAD a good one, too.)

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  21. Happy Halloween! I enjoyed all the Halloween humor here. :-)

    The doll story and video, however, freaked me out! AAAAH!

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    1. Thanks. I'm glad you liked my sick humor. (A real "treat", right?)

      Guess that makes Robert the "trick"...

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  22. I thought that Spawn was the scariest that I've come across, but that Robert doll comes a very close second.
    Very funny and scary post.

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    1. Spawn may be a living doll, but I think Robert's scarier.(Older, too!)

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  23. While dolls were always frightening, I find their scare tactics totally ridiculous! Did I just say that out loud? LOL

    Halloween funny!

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    1. HA! Well, you MIGHT have said it out loud... I'm a little deaf.

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  24. Chucky was the scariest film I ever saw. Hands down. Aargh.

    Happy Halloween to you and yours!

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    1. I'm glad I'm not the only fully-grown wimp who was freaked out by that darned Chucky.

      I hope you had a super Halloween.

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  25. I do not like Robert the Doll. If I ever visit Key West, I shall avoid him.

    Love,
    Janie

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  26. I'm not sure I could be married to an owner of such a doll.

    Happy Halloween! I love that holiday and all the chocolate that comes with it. We bought a whole bunch...and then went out to dinner. That means more chocolate for me!

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    1. Yeah, I know what you mean. That guy was a little weird, too.

      You cracked me up! Smarticus, too, when I told him about you going out for dinner. We actually had more trick-or-treaters than usual this year, but we still have leftover candy. (Oh, darn.)

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  27. I love to see bloggers having fun with the holiday. Frightastic. Happy Halloween.

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    1. Yeah, me too. I hope you had a happy Halloween, too. (Love the cute Frankenstein profile pic.)

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  28. Susan, a very funny post, thank you! Our merchants were very glad to import Halloween about 20 years ago - before I was the only mother in Hildesheim who decorated for Halloween, and the children liked it very much - though there was no possibility for them to get candies elsewhere from neighbours :-)

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    1. Dear Britta,

      Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed it.

      I wondered about the celebration of Halloween in other countries. It's interesting that it's only "infected" Germany twenty years ago. Maybe in time, it'll become more popular there. (You were probably the most popular mom in your neighborhood!)

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  29. I really enjoyed this post and the pictures you shared. Halloween is my favorite holiday, so I love to go all out, too. :) I never actually watched the Chucky movies. And since they scared you so much I may pass. lol

    Oh, and I love the photo of the tree on your header.

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    1. Thanks. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

      Thanks for stopping by and for signing on as a new follower. I go appreciate it. Welcome aboard!

      Delete
  30. Robert is happy because he retired in Florida. That's where I want to retire too. ;) :)

    And lol at your jokes all over this post, you made me laugh...too bad I didn't read it yesterday, we went out to eat w/the in-laws after the festivities and I ordered fettucini...woulda' been better to order it afraid-o. ;)

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    1. I enjoy visiting Florida, but I don't know if I'd want to live there. It gets too darned hot! (Georgia is bad enough.)

      HA! Or you could've ordered ghoul-ash...

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  31. As usual you just made my day better, which was good enough. new bike, my football team won today and I got a parcel delivered by DHL in record time. And now your blog. Wow, life is beautiful. I only "got" Halloween when I moved to the UK. I must admit that I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand it's a nice tradition, on the other hand if you don't "treat" children, your windows get egged, like ours did last year. This year we decided to go out and avoid the whole "trick or treat" palaver.

    Greetings from London.

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    1. Well, thank you. How sweet!

      There used to be a lot of egging, car window-soaping, and toilet paper tossed all over yards and in the trees on Halloween when I was a kid,(Not by ME, mind you!) but I haven't heard about any of those sorts of things going on in years. Not in our neighborhood, anyway.

      Greetings back atcha.

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  32. Seeing Robert reminds me of a Night Gallery episode about a killer doll long before Chucky was born. Though I was pretty frightened at the time, those classic episodes would be considered quite mild today. Sorry you weren't allowed to go trick-or-treating as a kid. I'm sure you made up for it with your children. Lots of fun wordplay!

    Julie

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    1. Most of the movies that scared the stuffing out of us when we were kids were definitiely low-tech and cheesy by today's standards.

      Oh, I did go trick-or-treating ONE time as a kid. (My father was working the 3-11 shift, and my mother succumbed to my begging.) I was thirteen at the time. I'll tell ya about it one day.

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  33. Speaking of goblins and ghoules and the like, I'm reminded of an old prayer:

    From ghoulies and ghosties
    And long-leggedy beasties
    And things that go bump in the night,
    Good Lord, deliver us!

    blessings and Bear hugs, too!

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    1. I love that prayer/poem. If I'm not mistaken, it was written by Robert Burns. An embroidered copy of it hung on our younger son's bedroom wall when he was a young boy.

      Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. (One can NEVER get too many bear hugs!)

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    2. Never too many Bear hugs from a gentle, mild-mannered Bear. I, on the other hand. . . .

      Blessings and Bear hugs, anyhow. And thanks for visiting and leaving a note.

      Delete
  34. Aaah! AAh! (that's me screaming) Chucky!
    The only doll that ever freak out scared me, I couldn't even watch the whole movie and we LOVE scared to death horror movies.
    I love the house in that first photo, it would look so spooky in the dark.

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    1. I'm glad to hear I'm not the only ol' wimp who gets freaked out by that weirdo doll Chucky.

      Yeah, I like that house, too.I'll betcha the people who live in it even play scary music to set the mood after dark.

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  35. life is indeed a mystery!! ...very scary but really enjoyed ur post ...there are many things that science need to prove...smiles:))

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    1. Just as some people choose to ignore the lessons of science, there are some things science would also rather ignore. ☺

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  36. I love that this post had a little something for everyone. Scares, laughs, and puns galore. I've not heard of Robert the Doll, but I've heard of Annabelle the Doll, and she's just as terrifying. The lesson here? Don't ever buy dolls. They will haunt you.

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    1. I never heard of Annabelle. Well, no worries here. The last doll I bought is an ALF doll, and he behaves himself quite nicely. (Although I have caught him eyeing our cats a time or two...)

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  37. As scary as Halloween may be, as you said, the thought of re-run election is the scariest of all. That would be like waiting for the other shoe to drop. But maybe we could keep having re-run elections for the next 2 years. Ha

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    1. They can hold as many re-run elections as they'd like, as long as they get rid of those ads and robo-calls. Too bad there isn't a way to opt out of them.

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  38. Friday was clear, although we had no trick or treaters. I haven't seen them in over a decade. Around here they go to malls and other public places.

    I DVRed some scary movies and will watch them soon.

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    1. A lot of the kids around here go to malls or other pre-designated areas to do their trick-or-treating, too, but we had a surprisingly large number come to our door this year. More so than in many years. It was kinda nice.

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  39. Oh, I love creepy stories like Robert the Doll. I don't know what it is about dolls or toys in general, but scary stories revolving around those are always especially creepy. Maybe because it has to do with childhood innocence.

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    1. Yeah, I think you're right about childhood innocence having something to do with how creepy a haunted doll or toy is to most us. We want to relax and "trust" that doll or toy, not have it betray us by scaring the daylights out of us.

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  40. You are too funny---I love your Halloween jokes! Hey, that Robert doll is super creepy. I wouldn't want to see him, even if he is behind glass!

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    1. Thanks! Nobody appreciates puns like another punster.

      I don't think we'll be planning any vacations around visiting Robert, either.

      Delete
  41. Chuckie has always scared me and I can't remember if I've even seen the movie. Halloween was clear and kinda warm here, but not many trick or treat in London. Hope you had a great time!

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    1. I don't think I've watched an entire Chucky movie, either. (Unless closing my eyes and covering my ears counts as "watching"...)

      We had a good Halloween weather-wise, so LOTS of trick-or-treaters came to the door.

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  42. Okay, some of those lines were truly groan worthy. And you know I love a good groaner. But the doll...too creepy. (I always preferred stuffed animals.)

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    1. Some people might consider "good groaner" to be an oxymoron, but not ME! Takes a punster to appreciate a punster, right?

      Hey, I'm sure Robert is stuffed with... something... or someone...

      Delete
  43. Don't mess with Chucky. It's dangerous!!! Sounds like you've been having some fun.

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    1. Nope, don't mess with Chucky. Yeah, might as well have fun, right? Laughing doesn't cost a penny.

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  44. Hi, Doll. No pun intended, but I LOVE your Chucky-esq line. I'm going to try that in a sweet way next time I'm on a date or at a cafe or just anywhere..."I WANT CHOCOLATE!"

    Hope it was a great Hallow's Eve.
    Love 'n broad hugs and chocolate kisses. xo

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    1. HA! You called me "doll"... got me laughing right off the bat. Yeah, use that line... betcha it gets you some chocolate. Especially if you open your eyes real big and crane your neck forward.

      Yeah, it was. Broad hugs and kisses back atcha.

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