Shhh!

[Roger Kettle]

So far, so good. It's gone 8 o'clock and no sign of child-beggars at my door, asking for free chocolate. Of course, I've switched off the outside light and I'm sitting here under a cloak in case the glow from my computer screen can be seen in the street. You may think this is mean but I'm going by previous experience and, quite frankly, the standard of entertainment these kids provide is shocking. On Halloweens past, I've opened my door to find two 9 year-old brats wearing sheets and holding their hands out expectantly.
"Would you like a song?" they ask.
"That would be great", I reply "Are you familiar with Sunny Afternoon by The Kinks?"
Not ONCE has one of these freeloaders known this Ray Davies classic. Then they ask if I'd like to hear a joke. It's at that point I feel duty-bound to inform them that I'm a professional comic strip writer and anything they come up with better be of an acceptable standard. "Why did the chicken cross the road?" ventured a midget witch once. "Well, my dear", I responded " this is an extremely old joke which has, nevertheless, mutated into several..."------oh,oh. There goes the doorbell.
They'd better be good.

[Zesty White]

8pm? Well you didnt expect anyone to come round before X Factor finished did you?

[Diane CBPFC]

I would have thought that the "H1N1" sign you put on the door would have kept the little buggers away.

[Joan]

If I ask the kids here to do a 'turn'.  They just look at me like I'm from Mars.  Yeah, right - shall we throw eggs at the house or stuff confetti in the air vents of your cars and turn all the sprinklers on (that happened to us one year).  It's the big kids that do that sort of thing though - the littlies are just disappointed when they don't get their sugar rush.  Halloween here is based on the American version.  They didn't really start doing 'Trick or Treat' until the 90s and even then, there wasn't much else going on.  I had 5 little grommets appear at the door last night and dive into the bowl of fun size choccies I had in my hand.  Steady on, says I, just two each - there may be more little grommets (or big ones) coming.  Oh no, there's no one else out there.  The closest I got to a turn was the last little girl to leave who seemed to be performing a 'Woe is me!' type piece as she left.  I guessed she's one of my next door neighbour's troop - she has a tendency to be a bit dramatic at times.

[The Peepmaster]

I saw a good tip on the internet yesterday. It said that you should leave a dish outside the door with a couple of discarded sweet wrappers in. Alongside the dish you should have a notice reading, "Please help yourself. When they're gone, they're gone".

[Malc]

That's a good way to lose a dish.