“I would prefer more bright pagan holidays in my year.” – Old Sean
An Ode to Autumn Frights
I’m sure I’ve mentioned it many times and I believe I’ll mention it many more: I love Halloween. It’s my absolute favorite holiday in the United States.
Though I’ve already done a Halloween road trip for the year, I decided I’d also enjoy some local Halloween events around DC.
With my roommate’s permission, I borrowed his car and went on a little solo-trip around DC.
Literary Pumpkin Walk
Near Linkin Park, there’s a special holiday event called the Literary Pumpkin Walk. This little self-guided tour allows people to walk past various streets and spot Halloween decorations. The most important features are pumpkins, which are carved to match famous literature and books.
I parked on a leave-strewn street and began my many loops through the area. First, I simply enjoyed Halloween decoration in the area. But then, I started referencing my maps to properly appreciate the carved pumpkin aspects.
The people of this area commit excellently. There was a Merilyn Monroe, hobbits marching on a pumpkin’s surface, Harry-Potter-Glasses-and-Scar pumpkins, a series of dinosaurs, a fat pumpkin-scarecrow with rats referencing Ordre de Quarantaine, the Totally Mild Salsa Children’s Book dragons and several others.
There were also fishing skeletons, Jack-O’-Lanterns spitting eyeballs, vast spider webs, skeleton casts, dogs and flamingos, skull-cat carvings, demented gnomes, creepy tree-spirits, humorous tombstones, plenty of reapers and orange lights.
A Wizard’s Street
My favorite street, by far, was the Harry Potter-themed street. All neighbors on this narrow road agreed to make Harry-Potter decorations up and down the sidewalks.
There were Death Eater Wanted Posters, electric candles hanging above (like in Hogwarts’s Great Hall), fake Harry-Potter newspaper articles, skeletons in Gryffindor scarfs, recreations of Hog’s Head, a crashed toy-car crumpled on a “Whomping Willow,” hanging dementors and giant spiders.
It wasn’t very professional or uniform, but it was very enjoyable, clever and enthusiastic.
My absolute favorite feature was the “House Elf Rescue League” which included a number of socks stuck to the tops of fence posts.
Weekend Gatherings
After finishing my time enjoying Halloween decorations, I went to a small Halloween party with my friend Carl . We ended up meeting on a bar rooftop in Navy Yard, Washington DC.
The waterside district is home to a large baseball stadium and many pubs and beer gardens. I ended up following the party around on an impromptu bar crawl culminating with Korean-Mexican spicy chicken at a small restaurant called TaKorean.
Afterwards, I drove Carl home and started wandering back to my place in Fairfax. I had a severe amount of trouble getting back across the Potomac. I find that the chain of roads surrounding the National Monument riverside area is confusing, loopy and counterintuitive. I ended up making three false-starts back home before driving out of downtown DC in a sleepy stupor.
A Road Trip
For the actual day of Halloween, 2022 (which fell on a Monday evening), I had purchased tickets with my roommate Roy to go see another haunted house. The one we had visited the previous week had been so spectacular, I was craving another.
However, we had an errand to run first. Roy had just purchased a Lexus in a nearby town, so he asked me to drive his older Mazda back home after his purchase.
We ended up driving into Pennsylvania to pick up the car, hoping to avoid the enormous delivery fee the car would have required. Sadly, upon driving, we got hit by a storm. Though we made it to Pennsylvania and back without trouble, our haunted house event was rained out.
In the end, I still had an entertaining weekend in DC. I’m hoping to return to the US for another holiday later on. But in the meantime, Halloween has passed and the more prominent seasonal holidays have taken over stores and shops.
With Thanksgiving and Christmas right around the corner, I’m hunkering down in DC again.
Best regards and excellent trails,
Old Sean
Written November 2nd, 2022
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