LorieByrd.com

Horror Flicks

John Hawkins posted his top favorite horror movies of all time.

Scary

Here is a scary post from last year around this time.

Pumpkin Accident

Yes, the title is correct, it was a pumpkin-related accident. 

I have watched the reality show, Little People, Big World, a few times and enjoyed it.  The "little people" family owns a farm where they grow pumpkins and a few other things and are open to the public for tours.  The place is really cool, with all kinds of neat things for kids to do including an elaborate pirate ship and castle to explore.There was an accident at the Roloff farm, where the show is filmed, involving a catapult used to lob pumpkins into the air, injuring the son and an employee of the farm's owner.  I saw the episode where the catapult was built and I remember thinking then that it looked like a pretty dangerous device.

Pumpkin Carving Weekend

The picture above is of a pumpkin my husband carved today using a Pumpkin Masters pattern.  This picture was taken without a flash for maximum effect.  It took a lot of time to carve this design because there were so many tiny cutouts, but it is the one our six year old picked out and her daddy has trouble saying "no" to her. 

Update 9:00 p.m. ET:  Extreme Halloween is now on HGTV.  My cousin Beverly's home is one of those featured along with some other really cool Halloween houses.  My friend Teresa was inspired by one of the ideas at Beverly's website to create a Halloween feature in her yard and says it is getting rave reviews.  Hopefully I will have some pictures of it to post later.

Countdown to Halloween

For those looking for some non-political fun this weekend, check out some of the pumpkins at Extreme Pumpkins.com. Of course I guess the pumpkin below could be interpreted as a bit political considering it is what very likely could be taking place among those in the losing party November 7.

Update: Musing Minds has a "puppytini" costume in time for Halloween.

Check out my cousin's great Halloween ideas at Sleepless Souls.

10 Candidates, 10 Days

Robert Bluey at Human Events came up with an excellent idea to help conservative candidates in tough races over these last few days before the election.  I am posting it here in its entirety:

Having read the latest edition of the Evans-Novak Political Report, I decided to compare it to our list of Rightroots candidates to see everyone's chances less than two weeks to Election Day.

It turns out that nine candidates are in toss-up races. Another (Mike Bouchard) is surging in the polls and in fundraising. So what exactly should we do about it? With Saturday marking 10 days until Election Day, I had an idea.

How about a new Rightroots pitch: 10 Candidates, 10 Days. Click on the links for the following Rightroots-endorsed candidates to contribute to their campaigns. Your efforts will go a long way in these critical days leading up to November 7.

Michele Bachmann (MN-06)
Mike Bouchard (MI-Sen)
Max Burns (GA-12)
John Gard (WI-08)
Thomas Kean (NJ-Sen)
Mike McGavick (WA-Sen)
David McSweeney (IL-08)
Ray Meier (NY-24)
Peter Roskam (IL-06)
Michael Steele (MD-Sen)

What about the other 11 candidates on the Rightroots list? You're welcome to contribute to their campaigns as well, but I'm simply taking Novak's projections and translating them into the races where Rightroots candidates have the best shot of winning.

Please do your part to help! These last days are the most important

The Chicks Still Don't Get It

I watched the first segment of the Dixie Chicks pre-election special interview on Oprah.  They still don't get it.  They think that Natalie Maines' original statement that she was ashamed of the President is all that angered so many people.  Had she said that and left it at that, she would still be enjoying her previous record and concert ticket sales here in America.  People would have forgotten.  Instead, she made a string of statements showing not only contempt for the President, but for those fans that made her a multi-millionaire.  she  Then they spent the past three years playing political victims.  Their industry now is not musical, but political and it is as political victims.  That is what they have been marketing and selling the past three years.

The Chicks were treated as huge heroes by Oprah, who did not even mention the way they treated their fans.  Natalie talked about how she would not have made her non-apology apology to the president today, since so many more people have died and Katrina and everything.  Kanye look out.  Natalie might just be stepping on your Katrina territory.

Oprah said the documentary, Shut Up And Sing, was startling.  She was shocked by what those redneck American Southerners ssid about the Chicks.  Maybe Oprah ought to do a show about all the horrible, startling things some of those on the anti-war left say.  Maybe Oprah should go to a Code Pink protest, or visit Democratic Underground one day.  I doubt she would find anything of interest there though.  Certainly nothing that would encourage women to vote for Democrat.

Spooky Cake & Candy Cookoff

I am a huge fan of Food Network's challenge shows, but have enjoyed none any more than the Spooky Cake & Candy Cookoff challenge.  The challenge is to create a spooky cake and decorate it with handmade candy.  The details on the cakes and candies are incredible and the creativity and techniques employed are really interesting to see.  The disembodied fingers were terrifyingly lifelike and the tiny cobwebs made with a small cotton candy maker turned out really cool.

The show will air several more times before Halloween and the schedule can be found at the link above.  When I last checked there were no pictures of the cakes posted at the site, but I hope some will be added later.  The finished cakes were really something to see and since the theme was Halloween, they were fun and spooky, too. 

The Unvarnished Truth

Listening to Rush today I heard him quote CNN's reason for running the Iraq sniper video as a desire to show the "unvarnished truth." I wish that CNN was as concerned with showing us the unvarnished truth about many other subjects.

One subject that came to mind was abortion. If CNN finds it newsworthy to show U.S. troops being shot down by snipers so the public can see the unvarnished truth about the war, then why not show us the unvarnished truth about abortion. Let's see a partial birth abortion being performed before the election so that voters will know whether or not they want to vote for those in Congressmen who oppose a ban on it. Planned Parenthood's 90th birthday would be a perfect time to air it.

This "unvarnished truth" doesn't always have to be that shocking though. The same standard could be applied in countless ways. Maybe we could see video of some of those liberal politicians claiming to be men and women of the people walking out the front doors of their million dollar homes. Or maybe we could watch some radical environmentalist liberals flying around in their private jets and limousines. The problem with CNN's attempt at the "unvarnished truth" is that they never show the whole truth.

The State Fair Poll

My informal, unscientific "State Fair" poll has been at least as accurate as Gallop and Zogby. If you are planning a trip to your state fair, you might want to test it yourself.