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I like the Halloween motif on the front page. I never really 'got' Halloween until 2000, when we happened to be travelling in the US at the right time. Suddenly it all made a lot more sense: the weather, the brooding sense of the onset of winter, the moon, the houses... there was a spookiness that you just don't get here (not least because we've always just gone to daylight savings and it's bright and sunny.) Strangely enough I didn't get the Halloween thing from Europe either - but then again, it's not as celebrated there (and it was probably raining).
Ah, yes, the houses. During the week leading up to Halloween we were travelling from New York up to Toronto and then down again to Michigan. The houses in upstate New York were just trippy. They looked like houses out of horror flicks. That was also the first time I really understood that US teen horror movies are often actually set in suburbia - it looks nothing in Australia. I think the equivalent here would be setting a horror flick in a 3 bedroom brick veneer. (Of course our horror flicks aren't usually set in suburbia: Wolf Creek is probably one of the more accurate interpretations of horror to come out of the Australian subconscious recently. Not that I'm going to see it, I really don't need any more of that shit in my head. And besides, I saw the Forensic Investigators episode.)
We went to a Halloween party in Toronto, dressed up (well Dean was, I was sort of), and then spent the actual Halloween night in a small town in Michigan, which had wired up the town centre (it had one even) so that wolf howls and screams would occur randomly around you as you walked the streets. Then they had a children's dress up competition and party in the main square. We stood out like.. well complete foreigners really, but it was fine. I think most of the town already knew our names and where we were from from my 10 minute chat in the library and our wander through the shopping centre the night before anyway.
We finished up the night on MTV, watching docos on Alice Cooper, Marilyn Manson, Ozzy Osbourne... they had a theme going. We were also on the phone to Australia trying to convince the bank that they should uncancel our credit card as it wasn't actually being used fraudulently and we were actually in the US. And yes, there was a Liverpool in New York, dammit.
Actually, that would be a true Australian Horror Story.
Dealing With The Banks.
Ah, yes, the houses. During the week leading up to Halloween we were travelling from New York up to Toronto and then down again to Michigan. The houses in upstate New York were just trippy. They looked like houses out of horror flicks. That was also the first time I really understood that US teen horror movies are often actually set in suburbia - it looks nothing in Australia. I think the equivalent here would be setting a horror flick in a 3 bedroom brick veneer. (Of course our horror flicks aren't usually set in suburbia: Wolf Creek is probably one of the more accurate interpretations of horror to come out of the Australian subconscious recently. Not that I'm going to see it, I really don't need any more of that shit in my head. And besides, I saw the Forensic Investigators episode.)
We went to a Halloween party in Toronto, dressed up (well Dean was, I was sort of), and then spent the actual Halloween night in a small town in Michigan, which had wired up the town centre (it had one even) so that wolf howls and screams would occur randomly around you as you walked the streets. Then they had a children's dress up competition and party in the main square. We stood out like.. well complete foreigners really, but it was fine. I think most of the town already knew our names and where we were from from my 10 minute chat in the library and our wander through the shopping centre the night before anyway.
We finished up the night on MTV, watching docos on Alice Cooper, Marilyn Manson, Ozzy Osbourne... they had a theme going. We were also on the phone to Australia trying to convince the bank that they should uncancel our credit card as it wasn't actually being used fraudulently and we were actually in the US. And yes, there was a Liverpool in New York, dammit.
Actually, that would be a true Australian Horror Story.
Dealing With The Banks.
