Post Halloween Letdown

Dr Strange · Post by **Dr Strange** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 12:30 pm

I'm sure this has been discussed in the past but has anyone ever experienced a post halloween letdown? That sad feeling people get after Christmas is what I mean. I know I used to feel that way after Christmas, until I realized years ago to not make it all about a pile of presents to open on one morning.

To be honest with Thanksgiving and Christmas breathing down Halloween's neck I've never felt a let down, there's too much to do to get ready for November and December. And we always have a lot of halloween stuff to put away.

I remember a Simpson's Treehouse of Horror that had their two aliens talking about the reasons for airing a halloween special after Halloween (which has been the case with the THoH shows). The aliens already had their stockings up by a fireplace and remarked, "Who's thinking about halloween anymore?"

Anybody still wearing their costumes to mom's house for thanksgiving?

Big_Guh · Post by **Big_Guh** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 12:49 pm

Yep, I always endure a small case of Halloween letdown beginning every Nov. 1. I don't know, I just hate taking down all the decorations and seeing all the stores throw the remaining unsold jack-o-laterns and micellaneous goodies into bargain bins. It also sucks having all the horror movies taken off most channels. I usually recover pretty quickly though for the reasons you stated above regarding the closeness of Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Dr Strange · Post by **Dr Strange** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 1:05 pm

See that's another thing about it, right after Halloween you can grab all the stuff you wanted for a couple of bucks! So it's like halloween just keeps on giving. Some of our best decorations we've bought at Target in the weeks following. And my son has all the costumes for play he ever wanted cause we buy them in November.

He has all the male FF characters, Supeman and Hulk and I didn't even break a twenty.

tomanderson · Post by **tomanderson** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 1:23 pm

Definitely! It is one of the few BAD things about Halloween--that awful feeling when you know the evening is shutting down, and you start turning off the lights and things. The candy is gone, the TOTers are all gone, and all you hear is crickets.

It's fun of course to "do" Halloween year round, but doing it on the official day has a special thrill to it, and feeling that wrap up is a real bummer.

LawP · Post by **LawP** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 1:35 pm

There's definitely a let down but I so enjoy the after sales. I usually take the day after Halloween off from work so I can slowly, neatly put all my decorations away...while wiping tears...wishing it was Halloween all over again.

Thanksgiving and Christmas make me crazy. The bulk of the cooking, gifting, card sending, etc. falls on my shoulders so it's not as fun as it should be. I need to work on my delegating skills and put the family to work.

Dr Strange · Post by **Dr Strange** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 1:51 pm

Just tell your family what Lucy Van Pelt said, "What you need is involvement."

I guess we're lucky in that we live away from home so the holidays are all ours and we don't have to spend anytime in the car going places.

By the way, I was just in Ft Collins Colorado and about fell in love with the state. I told my wife we could live there, but she's tired of moving.

One Eye'd Jack · Post by **One Eye'd Jack** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 2:12 pm

I get that feeling three times a year. The toughest one for me is Christmas. We have three radio stations in Portland that play non-stop Christmas music starting the day after Thanksgiving and it doesn't ween the week between Christmas and New Years. The music just suddenly stops like you went through a time machine and nothing ever happened.

The other two, for me, are Halloween, of course, and the Superbowl. I'm pretty hard hit after Halloween, but like Dr.Strange pointed out, the deals you can find are great.
Now the day after Christmas is almost a fatal blow. It hits really hard and I'm just barely hanging on but, I still have a little breath left. The third and final shot is that to the head... a mercy killing if you will. The Superbowl is over and so is my year and I long for September, once more.

This year however, wasn't quite so bad, because, of course, my Colts fiiiiiiiiiiiinally won!!!!! It's been a long and greuling ten year wait, for me. I've been a Colts fan since the mid-90's when Jim Harbaugh was Quarterback.

LawP · Post by **LawP** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 3:38 pm

Dr. Strange, Ft. Collins is one of many beautiful places in Colorado. Glad you enjoyed your stay. OEJ, with all due respect to your favorite team, I thought I'd run screaming in the streets, pulling out my hair if I had to hear one more glowing testimonial about Peyton Manning!!! Hearing that name is like fingernails raking across a chalkboard. I'm hoping our Broncos will find their way this year - first preseason game tonight (YAY!).

I have to admit, once the superbowl is over, I too look forward to September.

Grizzly Giant · Post by **Grizzly Giant** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 5:21 pm

dude thats crazy i get what you guys are sayin, like around 10:30 on halloween your like "welp, another year gone" then the next day its thanksgiving and christmas everywhere. I don't know if they do it where you guys are at, but the wal-marts here will actually have like 1/3 of the christmas decor in like the garden section with the rest of the store being halloween then thanksgiving stuff. so as soon as it hits Nov. 1 its like damn its over. but retailers keep on truckin. Crazy

tomanderson · Post by **tomanderson** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 5:46 pm

At the end of "It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown!" I always empathized with Charlie Brown's line, "Another Halloween has come and gone..." He sounded so dejected, despite the fact that he seemed to have a tough time enjoying the holiday.

MichaelMyers · Post by **MichaelMyers** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 6:29 pm

It is a let down-the worst is packing up all the stuff!! Its exciting pulling it all out, but a pain to put it all back! We have all of ours in a off site storage unit, so it takes 3 trips back and forth to get it all to my house, and I have a large SUV. But I do like when the sales hit....more stuff to drag around!
Hey One-Eyed-Jack-I did not realize you were a Colts fan! I'm from Indy so it was a pretty big deal! Hubby went to the Superbowl and had a great time!

magickbean · Post by **magickbean** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 7:46 pm

I too feel a little bit of a comedown at the end of Halloween, but I also end up leaving my decorations up for a little while afterwards to bask in the Halloween memories. I wait until the Jack O' Lanterns have started to wilt and then I take things down and get all the party photos developed and make a collage of them. That eases me into the idea of November

Dutchess of Darkness · Post by **Dutchess of Darkness** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 11:08 pm

Well I hate to admit it, but I get the Pre & Post Halloween Blues

Pre because I get sad preparing for it because I know its going to come and go too darn fast, but I just try and do things so that it never really ends, like leaving up some decor year round, my Gothic/Halloween garden to keep me going through the dreaded summer, and of course I have music that I play year round, and my "personality" well its pretty much dark and halloweenish year round too. Then the real post Halloween is a huge Blues issue for me.
I've grown up all my life without family so I've never celebrated Thanksgiving, Easter, Christmas etc. Well not Traditional Xmas, you see I love gift giving so I do a lot of that over the xmas holidays, but I don't celebrate it with anyone, just me and my 3 spoiled Kitties. But then 12 years ago when hubby and I got together, well he has a very close family, so every year I do all the shopping, wrapping and shipping of all their gifts. In 12 years I've gone up once and spent xmas with all of them, but it was so hard on me, and since then I ship hubby up there whenever I can, which is about once every 3 years, other then that we just stay home and relax, take time to reflect, watch movies, just chill you know.
I don't deal well with the whole family scene so thats not my idea of a great xmas. I prefer to just stay at home wether it be with hubby or just me and the kitties and relax. Another thing I do is I play kind of a mystry Mrs Santa Role at xmas. Usually starting about August, whenever I see little trinkets, or cute little gifts I buy them, just little things, and I buy craft stuff and I do up a huge gift basket and donate it to our local Hospital's Psychiatric Ward. There are always Patients in there over the holidays because the holidays are hard for many people, and well some have nobody, and some are committed so they can't get passes to go out. So I do up a gift basket, and give it to the Rec Therapist and she gives it to the unit. The Rec Therapist gets to use all the stuff in the basket with the patients like the crafts, getting them involved in putting up the decorations I buy them, and she lets me know if there is going to be anyone in there over the holiday who doesn't have any family. She finds out wether its a male or female and some of their likes and dislikes, and well I buy them a little something, but they have no clue until xmas day when they wake up and theres a gift on their pillow or nighttable. And they only know that its from one of Santa's little helpers,hehehe.
I also like to try and donate a little something for the Homeless drop In Centre, like some decorations, or Candy Canes just something to show people that the spirit of giving is a live and well.
Every year we've always bought lots for the In-Laws, but we don't generally buy for ourselves,lol, generally no money left after shopping for everyone

But this year we are actaully thinking of cutting xmas out completely, for several reasons.
I love it when I can get hubby to go home for xmas though as his family treats him like a King, he gets good and spoiled and gets to spend time with all his many relatives, but I can't get him to go every year, so when he's home we just chill, which is fine with me

JACKRYAN592 · Post by **JACKRYAN592** » Mon Aug 13, 2007 11:32 pm

LAST YEAR I HAD THE POST HALLOWEEN BLUES SOMETHING TERRIBLE. THAT IS HOW I ENDED UP FINDING THIS WEBSITE. I WAS TERRIBLY DEJECTED THE DAY AFTER HALLOWEEN, AND WAS SURFING THE WEB FOR HALLOWEEN RELATED STUFF, TRYING TO HOLD ON TO THE LAST VESTIGES OF HALLOWEEN. I CAME ACROSS THIS SITE, AND HAVE BEEN HERE EVER SINCE. AS USUAL , I'M LOOKING FORWARD TO HALLOWEEN, BUT NOT THE DAY AFTER!

ooga_booga · Post by **ooga_booga** » Tue Aug 14, 2007 2:54 am

Since I didn't plan my halloween party well enough in advance last year, needless to say it was very rushed and it didn't turn out how I wanted it at all. So I felt a lot of post-halloween letdown. I immedietaly started making plans for this year's party, and it took me until about the end of November to stop thinking about halloween and get into the christmas spirit