"You HAVE to give us sweets!"

[customersruinmylife]

This happened less than five minutes ago, and I had to share it with everyone.

So what day is it today? Halloween. My plans included lying on the living room floor face down with the lights out so I wouldn't attract trick or treaters.

It's getting dark at the minute, but it's still pretty light. I was out in my back garden putting the bunnys away for the night. I suddenly hear someone coming down the alleyway down the side of my house.

"HELLLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO?????"

She ends up walking down the side of my house and into my back garden. It is a mother and two children, aged around 8.

Me: Excuse me?? What are you doing here?
M: Well you didn't answer the doorbell, but I saw you walking around your garden. Trick or Treat!!
Me: What? No! I don't have any treats.
M: You HAVE to, it's Halloween!
Me: Well I don't. How dare you spy through my windows. Go away!
M: Huh! Come on kids.
Me: And be thankful I didn't get you done for trespassing!

I am livid. This woman has rang my doorbell, and then peered through my living room window to see me wandering around the back garden! She then opened my side gate (which I normally have locked, not today for some reason) and walked around my house!

Seriously. When did Trick or Treat become a Human Right?

[fireheart]

holy cow that woman was rude!

I just keep doing whatever I'm doing without going near the door. People will ring and knock a few times, then they go away. Fortunately my area is a little thin as well so we don't get too many groups.

[redsox33413]

Trespassing is a crime in most places, and that DEFINITELY qualified as trespassing. Wonder if mommy dearest knows anything about the "castle doctrine" laws? What would happen if you had a dog penned up back there? What if you were burying bodies in your backyard? Geez. Total parental fail.

[scruff]

I am so so glad trick or treating isn't popular anywhere I've lived. As a kid me and some friends tried it a couple of times, but we spent far more time explaining the concept to confused neighbours than actually getting sweets, so we gave up. Most years we don't get any trick or treaters. Which is good, but most years we don't get any carol singers either, which I find sad.

[Elspeth]

Wow that mom is a piece of work. And how did she know you didn't have The Killer Rabbits of Caerbannog?

[ShadowBall]

Some people just cannot fathom that someone actually might not want to give their precious free candy. Obviously this is meant as a personal challenge on her person and she must rise to that challenge by ringing the doorbell and then going on the Halloween equivalent of an Easter egg hunt in someone's yard when they don't answer the door. Obviously no one would have the gall to intentionally deprive her darlings of sugar, so you must have just forgotten and she had to come and find you to remind you that you have an obligation to feed her kids.

I recall going trick-or-treating a mere six years ago (yes, I went when I was 18) and understanding that lights off = no candy from that house, so don't bother knocking or ringing.

Some people are much less forgiving about trespassing too, so Mommy ought to reconsider marching without permission through random yards if she doesn't want to be shot at or have someone's dog chowing down on her leg.

[redsox33413]

I recall going trick-or-treating a mere six years ago (yes, I went when I was 18) and understanding that lights off = no candy from that house, so don't bother knocking or ringing.

Some people are much less forgiving about trespassing too, so Mommy ought to reconsider marching without permission through random yards if she doesn't want to be shot at or have someone's dog chowing down on her leg.

^^^This. We were always taught no lights=no candy/don't even think about knocking/this property protected by Smith & Wesson/etc.

Also, my room mate and I love the holidays and we go all out decorating, but it never fails that we always end up with someone stealing or destroying decorations. So now we sit outside with the non-candy treats for the kids. We give out crayons and pencils because the little kids get a kick out of them, the parents appreciate the no cavities/no sugar high thing, and it keeps the ones who are really too old to be trick-or-treating away because all they really want is candy and "crayons are for little kids" (to quote a teenager last year).

No knocks against ShadowBall and the other teen trick-or-treaters, if you make the effort and are polite, I usually cave in and give you crayons, too. LOL.

[Mytical]

Yep no light = go away we don't want you here .

Me, I sit on my front porch with several large bowls of candy. My house is very popular

[Dytchdoctir]

"Crayons are for little kids" (to quote a teenager last year).

No knocks against ShadowBall and the other teen trick-or-treaters, if you make the effort and are polite, I usually cave in and give you crayons, too. LOL.

So would I. However, I would have responded to the "Crayons are for little kids" comment with, "So is Trick or Treat, asshole."

[Andara Bledin]

The only time I'd ever consider going up to a dark house was if there was something going on that said "I'm dark because it's supposed to be spooky" as opposed to the "I"m dark 'cause I don't want to deal with you, go away." We had a couple of really creepy houses my brother and I would hit when we were 10-ish.

We'd knock once, wait, and if there was no answer, we'd move on. There were already more houses in our area than we could possibly hit in the time limit we had, so it made more sense to go to the ones that wold give us candy quickly than to try to harass candy out of people who didn't want to give any out.

Obviously, most SC's can't manage to think as well as a pair of pre-teens.

^-.-^

[dragon_wings]

I'm kinda scared. I live in the ghetto and my room in on the first floor on the front of the house, which means I can't have any lights on or music or people will come up and pound on the front door. Unless one of my housemates are giving out candy (unlikely) I'm hiding. And I have to get up early tomorrow morning for work.

[PepperElf]

^^^This. We were always taught no lights=no candy/don't even think about knocking/this property protected by Smith & Wesson/etc.

I've always honored "no lights = no candy" cos hey not everyone does halloween. I've never even *considered* harassing someone for this cos... it's not like I didn't get enough chocolate.

Only problem here is... my BF says kids just don't knock. I mean hell sure I don't really like Mr. North much but if his kid knocked for some candy he'd get some.

maybe this year it'll be better. I made the apartment fucking obvious, stringing up lights across the porch.



on second thought: scratch that. Sure we had more this year than my BF had last year, but we're going to have a lot of leftovers. Last year he had none. So far we've had ... 5 or 6 kids, including one adult in costume I offered some candy to.

One of the adults was surprised at how much candy I gave his son but hey... it's not like we're running out. i mean really we opened 2 bags and haven't finished either one.

[ArcticChicken]

Wonder if mommy dearest knows anything about the "castle doctrine" laws?

CRML lives in Merry Olde England, and while the US's castle doctrine derives from English common law, it doesn't appear that a law like that is on the books..

[protege]

Uh guys? We're skirting Fratching here. Can we please redirect our attention to the idiots the OP mentioned...and leave the castle law stuff to Fratching?

[MadMike]

We were always taught no lights=no candy.

Exactly. They even state in the local newsletter that if you're giving out candy, leave your porch light on. If you're a trick-or-treater, don't go to houses that don't have their lights on.

My wife and I used to give out candy, and we could never get the amount of candy right. Some years, we ran out after the first hour. Other years, we had very few trick-or-treaters and ended up with a pile of leftovers. The first Halloween where we had our big, friendly, orange cat "Orange Bastard", he actually started crying because all these people were coming to our door but none of them were coming in to pet him.

A few years ago, we went on a cruise and weren't around for Trick-or-Treat night, and we just never started back up on giving out candy. So we left our porch light off, and never had anyone come to our door. Then, this year, it happened not once, but twice.

The first the was shortly after trick-or-treat started, and I wondered aloud who was at our door, since we don't get many unexpected visitors. It was a group of trick-or-treaters at our door, with the parents standing at the edge of the yard. Naturally, I wasn't going to be mean to little kids, so I told them as nicely as I could that we didn't have any candy, and then I turned to the parents and added, "That's why we didn't have our light on."

The doorbell rang again with about 10 minutes left, but this time I was downstairs on the computer and didn't bother going upstairs. A few minutes later, our houseguest told me it was another group of trick-or-treaters, and he just turned the living room light off instead of answering the door.