Wilderness Blues- Ramblings from the Great Land

   It's the time of year when so many people start to decorate their homes and lawns with Halloween themes. We drove down a street today just looking at new areas, and one house we passed was covered top to bottom with witches and tombstones, spiders, pumpkins, cob webs, ghosts and Lord knows what all else. I don't really know what pumpkins have to do with Halloween, except that they are harvested this time of year. It's funny that a holiday that is supposed to be spooky utilizes one of the same icons that Thanksgiving is known for. Does anyone have pumpkin pie for Halloween? I wonder how that would go over. The neighborhood kids knock on your door and instead of bags of candy corn or popcorn balls, you give them a piece of pumpkin pie. Would they soap your windows or string toilet paper around your trees if you didn't top the pie with whipped cream? It's hard to say. Kids can be vindictive. I'm reminded of a conversation that I had with some friends from my nei

    When my oldest daughter, Jennifer was a teacher, she used to sing a little song. "Clean up, Clean up... I don't know the rest of the words, if there were any others. She used to sing it to the class and around her house to her kids too I believe.  That song was running through my mind a couple days ago when I went out into the neighborhood with my long handled grabber and a trash bag. The day was really nice; sunny and about fifty degrees, which may sound chilly to those farther south, but it was comfortable for me. I just donned a jacket and got busy. My biggest fear was that someone would be watching me as they drove by and would run into me while I walked along the side of the road picking up other peoples trash. There is a city wide clean up in May, but I didn't want to have to see trash all over the ground until the snow falls. I like the idea of driving by and not having to see a bunch of plastic fast food cups, paper, booze bottles and all other manner of junk o