In the spirit of the season ...

Oh, what a lovely day.

Not being snide, or supercillious, whatever that means, or even sarcastic. We like rainy day Mondays, particularly if they coincide with Halloween. It's sets a great mood. We're keeping the lights down low and letting a little of that rain-cooled air in through the window, and wondering if chili dogs and fries wouldn't be perfect (along with pilfered candy meant for the neighborhood kiddies) while we load the multi-disc DVD player with our favorite fright movies of all time!

Not that we're really into most of the junk that passes for fright movies these days. Not into violence for the sake of violence ... it's gotta pander to some redeeming social value at some point ... and the movie can't be just totally brain dead either. No, we enjoy a little humor with our Halloween.

On tap for the afternoon and evening, will be:

Young Frankenstein.

The Sixth Sense.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

An American Werewolf in London.

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.

Poltergeist.

Van Helsing.

The Exorcist would be on the list if we actually owned a copy, but the Missus thinks having one on the shelf might constitute an open invitation to unwanted guests, or at the least an excuse for the entertainment center to spontaneously combust, so we don't. Probably too late to rent it today.

Ghostbusters sometimes makes the list but as much as we love this one it's too familiar, maybe just a bit too comedic for the day.

Then again, given some of the news out there in the real world, comedic is not so bad.

Must say something about Central Standard Time.

We like it.

Next year we get less of it, so it becomes even more precious. (That's the way things work according to the Law of Supply & Demand.) If Congress really thought that more daylight savings time was such a good thing for energy savings, why not start the change this year instead of 2006? It's all part of a big charade to pretend to care about saving energy by passing legislation that has no real impact on it, except to seriously aggravate the Oklahomilist and others who believe, as he does, that a real energy bill would involve mandating more refineries and drilling and offering a big, huge PRIZE to anyone who can come up with a new energy plan that doesn't involve growing corn in Nebraska and Iowa. (Corn is for eatin', not for burnin'.)

We are not going to save the planet by turning corn into gasoline, or by turning our clocks forward for another two months. We'll be damned lucky to save our economy unless Americans wake up to what's being done to us "for our own good." More on that later. Today or the 'morrow.

Looking around the neighborhood, we see that ...

Michael Bates is helping unmask the Let Tulsa Vote At-Large Cartel, which is doing its part to repeal representative government.

OkieDoke is horrified at the suggestion of an Oklahoma Department of Aging. Why not a Department of Elderly Excellence instead? He has other suggestions. So do we: if it costs more than $10 a year, let's just forget the whole thing. If it costs more they'll want to tax something.

The Mad Okie managed to find some time outside of Tulsa, specifically a Prattville pizzeria he passionately praises!

Chase cuts his own list of Halloween favorites, and we decided to latch onto "The Shining" just because he reminded us of its excellence. Gotta agree with his No.1 pick too. Maybe we'll go buy a copy and hide it.