Want to go to the haunted house?
"Zombies and witches declare war in Salem; Haunted houses feud at busiest season October 18, 2011|By Billy Baker, Globe Staff
SALEM - The series of events that culminated with the alleged assault on the zombies began when the Witch Mansion opened in the East India Square Mall, just in time for the huge Halloween season here.
The Witch Mansion is a pretty standard haunted house; it is dark and it is loud and things jump out at you. It has some 3-D gimmicks and slow animatronics, but what’s interesting about the Witch Mansion is the very end, when you exit into the mall and there, directly across the way, is another haunted house.
The Nightmare Factory opened in the mall five years ago, has been here year-round ever since and, naturally, does not like this competition one bit. So, the witches and the zombies went to war.
I'm horrified that the Globe never met a war it didn't want to promote.
I think I'll skip the haunted house after all.
The first incident, according to Marshall Tripoli, who owns the Nightmare Factory, was when one of the upstarts tried to trip one of his actors out on the pedestrian mall on Essex Street. The woman was wearing a straitjacket, which is not a good thing to trip in. Both houses leaflet heavily on the street, a main drag for October tourists, and where historical reenactors stage an arrest each day.
Tripoli countered on Friday by sending his mall ghouls, all of them very serious about their craft - “I care how I scare,’’ he said - to stand out in front of the newcomers and scream insults at Witch Mansion. When the police came, one of the ghouls said they were chanting “White Sox.’’
Then on Sunday, it got a little crazy: A zombie was hip-checked.
The zombie was walking with a group of zombies - “a family of zombies,’’ Tripoli said - handing out leaflets when one of the upstarts, dressed in a cape and a red mask, allegedly threw his hip into him. The zombie was a 60-year-old man, which is on the old side for a zombie. Police were called again.
John Denley, co-owner of the Witch Mansion, said the only explanation is that the bumping was accidental and that his actor’s vision was limited by the mask.
Tripoli is not buying it. “There is a war, a war has started,’’ he said. This isn’t a two-haunted-house mall, and Halloween is make-or-break. This is their Christmas, when he will pay his rent for the year, and there are only so many dollars out there.
This is not the first run-in between Tripoli and Denley. They have old bad blood, but Denley said he did not choose the location for his new haunted house to ruffle any feathers. But, Denley said, the location was exactly why they were going to win.
By location, he is referring to the fact that his attraction is entered on the outdoor pedestrian mall at the exact spot where the zombie family, which has been working for the Nightmare Factory for five years, goes to get its customers.
The Nightmare Factory has no outdoor frontage.
“We were smart in the first place,’’ Denley said. “We have a location outside where the people are. We won the war before it started, and that’s why he’s so upset. He’s got a gun with no bullets.’’
On Essex Street yesterday, there were people in costume everywhere soliciting. They sold haunted trolley rides and historical reenactments and fright. This is crunch time for the tourism industry in this city.
Britt Mitchell - who was portraying Bridget Bishop, the first woman executed in the witch trials - said feuds are part of October. “It’s when all the money comes in, so there is tension,’’ said Mitchell. “It’s the only month we make money.’’
In the tourist sections, it’s common for stores to pop up quickly in open spaces in October, and the year-round businesses have never been fans of this, said Bill Lazdowski, who owns Bewitched in Salem, a themed gift shop just next to both haunted houses. “It’s a pretty clear tactic that they did, to open right in front of the established business,’’ Lazdowski said.
The owners of Witch Mansion said they hoped they will be able to stay permanently at this location.
In the end, both sides say the winner will be decided where it matters: inside the haunted house. They each offer very similar experiences, though the Nightmare Factory uses more actors, jumping out in the dark with loud bangs and aggressive lighting, while the newer Witch Mansion involves 3D glasses and stopping to listen to animatronic figures talk.
But in the end, they both accomplish the same thing....
Gee, that wasn't scary at all.
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And what would a Halloween be without scary animals?
"Fungus faulted in deaths of 1m bats" October 27, 2011|By Bloomberg News
NEW YORK - A fungus is at fault for the deaths of one million North American bats, according to a study that is the first to pinpoint the cause for a phenomenon that scientists say may spur agricultural losses of $3.7 billion a year.
Yeah, whatever it is it is not genetically modified organi$m$.
The next question is how to attack it, said researchers at the US Geological Survey in Madison, Wis., who identified the Geomyces destructans fungus in a report yesterday in the journal Nature.
The war terminology continues; couldn't use the words solve or cure?
The flying mammals eat as much as two-thirds of their own weight in bugs nightly, including mosquitoes, grasshoppers, locusts, and moths that can spread disease and devastate crops....
And they are already too many hungry people.
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Related: Fear factor a black mark against darkest of cats
Problem is I know the most lovable black cat you ever saw, and I'm really, really sick of superstitious s*** posing as front page news in my flagship paper.
Okay, get your costume on and let's go trick-or-treating.
"This Is No Trick; Halloween defies push for healthy habits Some families rethink traditional glut of sweets" October 29, 2011|By Martine Powers and Carolyn Y. Johnson, Globe Staff
Let's not go to that house, readers.
Barbara Ferrer, Boston’s top health official, has railed against the perils of artery-clogging trans fat in doughnuts. She has exhorted the city’s youngsters, amid an epidemic of childhood obesity, to eat less, exercise more, and turn off the television.
That last part is good advice. Don't need all that diversion and propaganda in your ear.
Related:
"Researchers calculated the body mass index - a standard measurement of size.... There is growing debate about the accuracy of the standard method of calculating whether someone is overweight.... the system would put nearly half of NBA players in the overweight category"
Do lies make you fat because I'm full up on 'em?
So what to do on Halloween, a holiday that celebrates with abandon the delights of Snickers, Butterfingers, and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups?
The great question of life to ponder, yes.
On Monday, she will fill two baskets for trick-or-treaters: one with stickers, trinkets, and packets of dried fruits; the other with candy. Most children, she knows from experience, will choose the sweets.
“While we don’t encourage people to eat candy every day,’’ said Ferrer, executive director of the Boston Public Health Commission. “We certainly realize there are special occasions.’’
For parents regularly lectured on the importance of fruits and vegetables in their children’s diets, Oct. 31, it seems, is one day to ignore those admonitions.
“It’s the only time of the year when you get to eat a junkload of candy,’’ said Thelma McAvoy of Dorchester, as she shopped for a Batgirl costume with her daughter, Hailey, 5.
The problem is, Halloween’s candy cache can last weeks, said Joy Anastasia Gentry, founder of Reclaiming the Joy of Parenting, a consulting company.
Not like there is any $elf-$erving intere$t there, right?
And then, hot on its heels, comes Thanksgiving. And then, Hanukkah and Christmas, with their oil-laden latkes and gingerbread cookies....
This candy the Globe gave out tastes like s***.
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It's getting late. We better head home.
"Calif. sex offender parolees face Halloween curfew" October 28, 2011|Don Thompson, Associated Press
About 2,000 paroled California sex offenders have no permanent home partly because of a state law that bans them from living near schools or parks. This Halloween, however, many will spend the night together under supervision from authorities who want to make sure they have no contact with children out trick-or-treating.
It’s the first time the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is targeting offenders who live on the streets, under bridges or in nomadic campsites, though it has enforced a curfew on offenders who have permanent addresses for nearly 20 years under what it calls “Operation Boo.’’
Offenders have been ordered to report to parole centers from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Monday....
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Time to settle in with the candy and a movie:
"Mixed feelings as Hub heroes explore movie on its villain; Bulger’s portrayal may be challenge for Damon, Affleck" October 28, 2011|By Joseph P. Kahn, Globe Staff
Ben Affleck and Matt Damon grew up in Cambridge and have contributed their talents to a string of successful movies set in the Boston area, among them “Good Will Hunting,’’ “The Departed,’’ and “The Town.’’ Collectively these films have established Boston in the minds of moviegoers around the globe.
But their latest venture, a proposed movie about Boston mobster James “Whitey’’ Bulger, is already stirring mixed emotions among local people who have known Bulger and who fear it might glamorize a ruthless criminal.
Yeah, the movies and media never do that (blog editor rolls his eyes skyward).
We lionize war criminals and no one seems to have a problem with that.
“If anyone makes this movie, I’m pleased it’s these two. They’re brilliant,’’ said Tommy Donahue, whose father was allegedly killed by Bulger and his henchmen. “But I definitely have mixed emotions about this. Hopefully they can depict Whitey Bulger for what he is. They’ll need to do their homework, though.’’
How Bulger might be portrayed onscreen - Damon has indicated he wants the role - concerns attorney Anthony Cardinale as well. Bulger has been charged with 19 slayings, many shockingly brutal.
“If it’s done honestly, [Damon] will look like an idiot, a treacherous piece of junk. It’ll be a bad career move for him,’’ said Cardinale, who represented Francis “Cadillac Frank’’ Salemme, then the New England Mafia boss, in a case that helped expose Bulger’s corrupt ties with the FBI.
That would be the Fascist Bureau of Instigation for those that don't know.
If not done accurately, Cardinale added, “it’s a worse career move.’’
Bulger’s arrest in June and pending trial may yield even more details of gruesome killings and FBI corruption, heightening interest in any dramatization of the mobster’s life and crimes.
That is what they are really worried about.
But along with the interest come questions about how key pieces of the story might be treated or left out.
I understand that feeling being a reader of the Boston Globe.
On the one hand, there is widespread praise for Affleck and Damon as homegrown stars who have never abandoned their roots.
Didn't Damon narrate Inside Job?
“As a Bostonian, I’m proud of them,’’ said defense attorney Joseph Oteri, a longtime Bulger family friend.
His primary concern is whether their film does “a hatchet job’’ on William Bulger, the former Massachusetts Senate president who is the gangster’s brother, and not how it treats Whitey. “Southie is a state of mind, not a place,’’ Oteri said, and Affleck and Damon “know how to capture that mentality.’’
On the other hand, there is worry that a big-budget production built around Damon and Affleck might romanticize Bulger and his gang, or even turn Bulger himself into a sympathetic figure, no matter how dark the film is.
According to Thomas Foley, the former Massachusetts State Police colonel who helped build the criminal case against Bulger, it is critically important that any such movie strives to be more than pure entertainment. It should also, he said, be faithful to what really happened - notably, Bulger’s role as an FBI informant, which began in the 1970s - without “making [Bulger] any more of a celebrity than he is now.’’
Rare is the movie that will be faithful to history or the truth, especially coming out of Hollywood. More than likely it never gets made.
That is a tall order, conceded Foley, who is working on his own book about the Bulger case. “What angle will they take? I don’t know, but this happened over many years. It’s hard to get your arms around all that in a two-hour movie.’’
Would you mind if we watched something else, readers?
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