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All Hallow's Eve

It seemed like a shame to delete all the Hallowe'en submissions coming in today, so let's see if we can figure out something useful to do with them. Tonight is a full moon, which is a bad thing if you happen to be around animals. Several readers sent in Mac O' Lanterns of various types. One soul sent in a Jack O' Linux. This guy carves big pumpkins (be sure to click the arrows to see the finished versions). And if all else fails, bring out the Gimp.

158 comments

  1. I r0X0r!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    because I just do!

    Yea Halloween!

  2. Jack O Linux? by Cheetah86 · · Score: 1

    Is it me or is msn.com in the background on another computer in the Jack O Linux pictures(not the kde one, but look behind it to the right)... Maybe they should have chosen kernel.org as a background picture instead.(Or any other linux related site)

    1. Re:Jack O Linux? by rpoulton · · Score: 1

      Not only is it the msn.com website, but he is using MSN Explorer... and it looks like the server runs Frontpage, too :P

      --
      http://www.crudmuffin.com
    2. Re:Jack O Linux? by smasch · · Score: 1

      Yeah, that is MSN. And he's also using a recent version of Windows (98 or higher). You can tell by looking at the folder he has open on the right half of the screen. Not very Linux-ish if you ask me.

    3. Re:Jack O Linux? by Antipop · · Score: 1

      Oh no! The Linux police are out tonight deciding who's leet or and who's not!

    4. Re:Jack O Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He says he's running KDE. He is not. I'm just saying is all.

    5. Re:Jack O Linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      He's running KDE on the pumpkin. That's all that they said that thay were running KDE on. Piss ant.

    6. Re:Jack O Linux? by jrockway · · Score: 1

      and it looks like KDE1 *sigh* (on the jack-o-linux box)

      --
      My other car is first.
  3. Not just a full moon by rant-mode-on · · Score: 5, Interesting


    Its not just a full moon, its also a blue moon (2nd full moon inside a calendar month). The first blue moon on Halloween since 1955.

    1. Re:Not just a full moon by Cato+the+Elder · · Score: 2, Informative

      Well, wouldn't it be kinda hard to have a full moon on the 31st without having had one earlier in the month?

    2. Re:Not just a full moon by maniac11 · · Score: 2

      And the last one until 2020.

      --
      Guvegrra?
    3. Re:Not just a full moon by ratguy · · Score: 1

      Wouldn't all full moons on Halloween be Blue Moons? Since October is 31 days long, Halloween being the 31st, and there's a full moon every 28 days or so, wouldn't it make it impossible for it not to be a Blue Moon whenever there's a full moon this late in the month?

      Ratguy

    4. Re:Not just a full moon by 4mn0t1337 · · Score: 2, Interesting
      Full moon is a specific event (not just "a whole lotta light reflected from the surface."). For it to happen *exactly* on the 31st must mean that the first moon of the month was on or about Oct. 2nd.

      So, yes, "all full moons on Halloween [would] be Blue Moons." Everytime it happens, that is the case. But the point is that it still doesn't happen that often.

      --

      ______
      Once: you're a philosopher. Twice: a pervert.

    5. Re:Not just a full moon by Ian+Peon · · Score: 3, Informative
      Appearantly the "Blue Moon" = 2 full moons in a month only came about in the last 20 years.


      According to them, it was originally defined as an extra moon within a season - since all 12 full moons within the year have a specific name relative to their season, this extra moon was the blue one.


      So, (as has been pointed out) with our more recent definition, every Halloween full moon will be a blue moon, but with the old definition it would would be blue. (blue moons could only be in Feb/March, May/June, Aug/Sept or Nov/Dec - at the end of the season)

    6. Re:Not just a full moon by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      last time was 1955 (hello mcfly!)

      next time will be 2020 (hey boring white guys on tv!)

    7. Re:Not just a full moon by Dolly_Llama · · Score: 2

      Is that like those months with three paydays?

      --

      Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known. -- Carl Sagan

    8. Re:Not just a full moon by xmedar · · Score: 2

      Yes, but it's just not the same without M$ releasing their documents Open Source

      --
      Any sufficiently advanced man is indistinguishable from God
    9. Re:Not just a full moon by /dev/trash · · Score: 1

      In what time zone? For us east coasters.....the full moon is Nov. 1

    10. Re:Not just a full moon by Miles · · Score: 2, Informative

      And for a great short story about the expression, 'once in a blue moon', check out Connie Willis' "Blued Moon" in her book
      Fire Watch [amazon.com].

    11. Re:Not just a full moon by dachshund · · Score: 1
      Absolutely.

      The upshot of the above is that they happen on average once every 2.5 years, as the average moon lasts 29.5 days.

      However, they rarely happen on Halloween... Apparently.

    12. Re:Not just a full moon by jhestyr · · Score: 1

      Not just a blue full moon either
      This is a Blue Harvest Moon, the next one wont be until *scratches head* 2022 (i think that's what i heard on NPR)

    13. Re:Not just a full moon by mshiltonj · · Score: 0

      If you ever have a full moon on Halloween, it has to be a blue moon. Do the math

  4. Whoo hoo! by ecliptik · · Score: 1

    That gimp guy is kinda freakin me out.... I thought that the geek stories were scary, but a many with a mask that looks like a... what exactly is "The Gimp" mascot anyway? A Mole?

    1. Re:Whoo hoo! by Murdock037 · · Score: 1

      It's a hairy, chubby grown man wearing a leather mask and chains.

      Didn't you see "Pulp Fiction?"

    2. Re:Whoo hoo! by Eagle7 · · Score: 2

      The mascot is Wilbur. Duh.

      --
      _sig_ is away
    3. Re:Whoo hoo! by Art+Tatum · · Score: 1
      It's a hairy, chubby grown man wearing a leather mask and chains.


      Didn't you see "Pulp Fiction?"

      Ugh...don't remind me of that. I saw that in High School with some friends. One of the guys had seen it already and told us we didn't really want to see what was about to happen and that we probably should shut our eyes. We, being the brave idiots that we were, decided to watch anyway. Boy was that dumb.

  5. I'll be glad.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    I'll be glad when it's all over, Halloween is no fun for us adults, we just get hassled off loads of kids who demand things off you.

    Children are getting less polite all the time, one time kids used to be friendly, now if you don't have anything to give them (and after the 5th kid visits I don't) then all you get is verbal abuse.

    --
    Monkey on Toast!

    1. Re:I'll be glad.... by Joe+the+Lesser · · Score: 1

      Kids would be friendly if maybe you were nice to them. And God knows they go through hell in elementary school, so heaven forbid they have one night to express their rage towards the institutional societies they're being assimilated into.

      --
      "I only speak the truth"
      Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
    2. Re:I'll be glad.... by BigBir3d · · Score: 1

      Think this behavior is picked up from their parents? Generally, kids only know what is taught, by parents, or TV, friends, whatever. It is not the kids fault that their parents don't give a shit.

    3. Re:I'll be glad.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      That I have to agree with, however kids go on it has to be someone to blame, whether it's what's seen on TV, pressure from friends or bad parenting.

      --
      Monkey on Toast

  6. Halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You'll burn in hell with Tinky Winky and Larry Flint for celebrating Halloween -Jerry Falwell

  7. Halloween's full moon is rare treat by mxpengin · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This halloween will be very special, with the crisis we are living and some superstitious facts. CNN tells us: To make the superstitious even more jittery, a constellation associated with the some end-of-the-world beliefs will also be at the top of Wednesday night's sky.
    Look a great article about this at cnn.com .

    --
    "We all know Linux is great...it does infinite loops in 5 seconds." -- Linus
    1. Re:Halloween's full moon is rare treat by MalcalypseTheYounger · · Score: 1

      Gee, that looks suspiciously like the very first link in the posting. Will the wonders that defy modern science never cease?

    2. Re:Halloween's full moon is rare treat by kyras · · Score: 1

      Crisis? I'm not living in a crisis until I get *drafted*.

      --
      Tastes like burning! - Ralph Wiggum
  8. Are you done? by Kris_J · · Score: 0, Flamebait

    As if April Fool's isn't tendious enough, we have to wade through America's facination with Halloween at the end of October. I don't suppose the "Christmas Cheer" entry in the story exclusion options can be expanded to include all cultural and religious festivals...

    1. Re:Are you done? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Well "Christmas Cheer" definitely should not include any religious festivals ;)

      --
      Monkey on Toast

  9. poot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    double poot.

  10. call me a wimp... by Misha · · Score: 1

    but the sight of an orange "glow in the dark" MacOS logo keeps me up at night... there's nothing scarier than a bootup screen starring at you all night

    --



    I was thinking of how to intentionally fail my drug test... It would make a good memoir story someday.
  11. Terrorism by death_denied · · Score: 1

    Put on a Cowboy Neal costume and you will be fried harder than bin Laden under the new Anti-Terrorism bill. Just imagine what kind of a traumatic experience the kids will have.

  12. Not only a full moon tonight... by 4mn0t1337 · · Score: 5, Informative
    It is really a Blue Moon.

    From the article:
    what's so unusual about a blue moon on Halloween is that it last shone over California in 1944. And there won't be another until the year 2020

    And:
    The blue moon was originally defined by the Maine Farmer's Almanac in 1819 as an extra full moon within any season. Later, however, the respected publication Sky and Telescope altered the almanac's definition and since then it has come to mean the second full moon within a single month.

    --

    ______
    Once: you're a philosopher. Twice: a pervert.

    1. Re:Not only a full moon tonight... by cporter · · Score: 1
      well, as long as we're being pedantic, it's not quite a Blue Moon everywhere tonight. A very good explanation is available. In the U.S., only points in Chicago (US Central TZ) or west have a blue moon tonight.

      Points between US Eastern TZ and Moscow have a blue moon in November.

  13. This is a link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
  14. wait, does this qualify as a quicky? by Spiral+Man · · Score: 3, Interesting
    please say quickies are back. please, please, please!

    --
    "we demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!" --Douglas Adams, The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
  15. a model return by Jingle+Returno · · Score: 0

    A sudden complication between us.

    There ahead lies nothing of it, yet.

  16. Halloween? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What is this Halloween thing?

    rh

  17. What?? by avalys · · Score: 1

    Does anyone but me find it strange that a "military school" is having jack-o-lantern carving contests? Seems more like an elementary school to me...

    --
    This space intentionally left blank.
    1. Re:What?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's military school for lard-asses. Do a pushup, eat a cupcake.

    2. Re:What?? by justletmeinnow · · Score: 1

      They've gotta keep them busy doing something. You can't make them stand in one spot and stare for more than a couple days at a time... Of course, I don't think I'd give them knives for carving. Maybe they should stand in one spot holding a pumpkin for a couple more days...

      --
      Just because I AM paranoid doesn't mean they're NOT out to get me.
    3. Re:What?? by spudnic · · Score: 2

      I heard on a news report yesterday that sailors on the ships by Afghanistan where having door decorating contests.

      You have to have something to releive tension and provide a tie back to your homeland, especially on holidays. I wouldn't consider Halloween a major holiday, but I'm sure it helps them mentally.

      More power to them.

      --
      load "linux",8,1
  18. Gawd, relax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe you should just exclude Funny...

    1. Re:Gawd, relax! by DodgyGeezer · · Score: 1

      Why's it in the funny section anyway? It's pretty pathetic and unimaginative, and far from funny. It's the same tired old commercialized crap every year. The corporations who so many people seem to want to *give* their money too even have Americans calling Halloween a holiday. In my book, a holiday involves time off work. Talk about being conned. Use some imagination and organize a fancy dress party around your own theme at some other point in the year instead of doing it when corpor^H^H^H^H^H^Hsociety tells you. Why do people need other people dressing up before they'll do it themselves? Pathetic! Now, if you want a good celebration that has some spirit, try the British Guy Fawkes night... you'll get to burn shit!

    2. Re:Gawd, relax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Now, if you want a good celebration that has some spirit, try the British Guy Fawkes night... you'll get to burn shit!

      What? We get to burn the current Government? ;)
      Guy Fawkes night was originally a failed attempt to blow up the UK Parliament. I assume we're celebrating the fact that he failed but with Bill Gates loving Tony Blair I think most of us would prefer a decent Government in control ;)

      --
      Monkey on Toast

    3. Re:Gawd, relax! by easter1916 · · Score: 0, Interesting

      In Ireland, where Halloween originated as "Samhain", a pre-christian Celtic celebration, we light huge bonfires, the trick or treaters must *perform* some kind of song and dance or funny routine to earn cash, not candy.

    4. Re:Gawd, relax! by Malc · · Score: 1

      As I recall from a tour of The Tower, Guy Fawkes Night (a.k.a. Bonfire Night on 5th November) celebrates his rather gruesome execution. Yes, he was hung, drawn (dragged around the streets behind a horse and cart) and quartered (chopped up). And then, to make sure he was really dead, his remains were burnt in a bonfire. The idea of burning an effigy (sp?) of Guy Fawkes on a bonfire to celebrate defeating him and his gunpowder plot is actually quite sick!

    5. Re:Gawd, relax! by pyite · · Score: 1

      Well, you see... The Catholics tend to celebrate his efforts while the Anglicans tend to celebrate his defeat. It was after all a rather Catholic plot to blow up the highly Anglican Paraliament. In case anyone is wondering the Gun Powder Plot was Guy Fawkes' plan (I think he was just the one who got caught actually) to blow up a session of Parliament in England along with members of the monarchy in attendance. It was at an event similar to the U.S.'s State of the Union address. He was caught with large quantities of explosives in the building shortly before it was to occur.

      --

      "Nature doesn't care how smart you are. You can still be wrong." - Richard Feynman

    6. Re:Gawd, relax! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think you'll find that these days most people
      celebrate his efforts as the government here
      could do with a couple of kegs of gunpowder as far as most brits are concerned :)

    7. Re:Gawd, relax! by RFC959 · · Score: 1

      Alternately, the whole thing may have been a setup by the Queen's intelligence service. The way in which the "conspiracy" was discovered was a little fishy, Fawkes was tortured until he confessed, the other "conspirators" pleaded not guilty (not having had the uh, "benefit" of the same treatment), and the trial seems to have been a foregone conclusion.

  19. Slow night, but DON'T SURRENDER by fbrehm · · Score: 1

    Here in Lawrenceville, NJ, in between Trenton (where anthrax was found in the post office) and Princeton (where anthrax was found in the post office) and Ewing (where anthrax was found in the post office) the number of small kids coming around is down significantly from recent years. My kids (a step up from the small variety) are going out right now. I say DON'T SURRENDER TO THE DAMN TERRORISTS.

    1. Re:Slow night, but DON'T SURRENDER by Art+Tatum · · Score: 1
      Heh, for a second there, I thought you were about to say something about not surrendering to all the annoying little kids who will TP your house if you don't give them candy (and sometimes even if you do). ;-)

      Seriously, you're absolutely right. We've got to remember where the "terror" in "terrorism" comes from: their desire is not to devestate so much as to frighten and bewilder. The more we worry and bite our nails over this stuff, the more successful they will deem this to be.

  20. Okay, here we goooo! by fobbman · · Score: 2

    The Gimp link mentioned in the body of the story has 1108 hits as of right now. Let's measure what the /. effect can do.

    1. Re:Okay, here we goooo! by xanadu-xtroot.com · · Score: 1

      I don't know what you're smoking, but as of 7:07 EDT, it says 388...

      --
      I'm not a prophet or a stone-age man,
      I'm just a mortal with potential of a super man.
    2. Re:Okay, here we goooo! by damiam · · Score: 1

      I don't know what you're smoking, but everyone else is using Easter Standard Time, as of last weekend.

      --
      It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.
  21. Kernel Panic Pie by EccentricAnomaly · · Score: 5, Funny

    10-31-2001 Duuude, me and my buds have a great idea -- we took our machine and put it in a pumpkin -- we call it "Jack-O-Linux" get it? Linus would be proud!

    11-04-2001 JOL (Jack-O-Linux) has begun to smell. I'm beginning to regret not putting in a fan as playing Quake tends to heat it up quite a bit and makes the rotting stench almost unbearable... should've used a Crusoe.

    11-06-2001 JOL caught on fire today. I think a piece of rotting pumpkin flesh fell onto the sound card and caused a spark... I'm not really sure though, as I'm afraid to look inside the pumpkin.

    11-07-2001 Fabreeze doesn't work on pumkins

    11-09-2001 The JOL exploded today as I was browsing slashdot. Apparently the Methane inside the pumkin built up to critical levels. Now my room smells like an odd mixture of farts, pumpkin pie, ozone, and death. Funny thing though -- JOL still boots.

    11-10-2001 Drinking with my buds tonight we came up with a great idea: B-E-O-W-O-L-F..

    --
    There are 10 types of people in this world, those who can count in binary and those who can't.
    1. Re:Kernel Panic Pie by jrockway · · Score: 1

      Oh man. That's the first time I laughed out loud reading slashdot for a while. Mod this up :)

      --
      My other car is first.
    2. Re:Kernel Panic Pie by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Man, I snorted out loud during the "sad" scene at the end of Dawson's Creek (the one where Dawson's dad dies.) Everybody else in the room started laughing too... Well, I guess it was kinda funny.

    3. Re:Kernel Panic Pie by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, too bad i was in the class, teacher looked me for a while, because i was laughing loudly in class ;-)

  22. Don't trust the skeptics... by update() · · Score: 2
    From the animal bite paper:
    The effect of the phases of the moon on human nature and behaviour is well documented; some studies show positive aspects of the association and some show negative aspects. Crime, crisis incidence, human aggression, human births, and traffic accidents are all positively correlated with the phases of the moon.2-6 Some articles have suggested that the full moon has no influence on human insanity, alcohol intake, drug overdose, trauma, or the volume of patients in emergency departments.

    Translation -- studies on the effect of the lunar cycle on various things turn up contradictory results.

    Nonetheless, the study linked here looks pretty sound to me, with fairly objective data measurement and P less than 0.001. I'd be interested to see a better breakdown of the animals involved but this sample seems to be so heavily weighted to dog bites that it probably doesn't matter.

    Of course, the sort of people who style themselves "skeptics" confidently assert that the lunar cycle has no effect on anything. Those guys always rub me the wrong way, anyway, but if you're going to be a superior, sneering prick about other people's ideas, you should at least make sure that your "debunking" is accurate.

    It's like how in college, your professors tell you that much of what you learned in high school is false. And then you discover that just about everything you were taught in college ws wrong.

    1. Re:Don't trust the skeptics... by j-beda · · Score: 3, Informative
      I seems to me that most of the reviews of the literature on lunar effects turn up biases in most of the studies that show the effects.

      If you take your data from the wrong couple of years and you find if your full moons occur disproportionaltely on weekends, is it that surprising that there are more hospital visits? Drunks and partiers are always doing wierd stuff on weekends. Since there are only a dozen or so full moons in a year, it is hard to get sufficient data to even out statistical effects such as this.

      Cecil Adams has a couple articles on some of these things such as crazies and full moons and for a discussion of blue moons. Anyway, the study sighted took place over two years, which is about 24 months. No mention was made about the effect of day of the week which is probably only the first effect to control for. Do people go out hunting more often when the moon is full due to the better lighting? Are more people outside at night on those dates? Are people more likely to go to the hospital on these dates for some reason even if the biting rate doesn't change on these dates?

      The fact that the author makes statemets like "Human behaviour is altered during the full moon period" after saying that the studies are contradictory and then goes on to say that their study adds "Animals have an increased propensity to bite humans during the full moon periods" (at best they have shown that more people come to the hospital with animal bites in these periods). These types of conclusions do not fill me with confidence in any of the other work.

    2. Re:Don't trust the skeptics... by altstadt · · Score: 1

      Anybody can tell you that the full moon has a provable effect. Police reports all over the world show that nearly 100% of all crimes are committed within 14 days of a full moon.

      Call your local police detachment and ask them if you don't believe me.

    3. Re:Don't trust the skeptics... by altstadt · · Score: 1

      And since many people don't seem to understand this...

      Scott Adams reported in a Dilbert a few years back that 40% (that's nearly half) of all sick days are taken on Monday and Friday.

      Someone I used to work with/for used to get into fights in the grad student lounge by loudly declaring that 50% of all women had below average intelligence.

      Just because you have statistics on your side doesn't mean you have proven causuality.

    4. Re:Don't trust the skeptics... by passion · · Score: 2

      As a Darwinist, I can easily see how a full moon has affected animals behavior. Throughout our evolution, animals have found that full moons afford more light for hunting. As this would roughly extend hunting season from around 12 hours to around 24, I could easily see why both predators and prey would want to get excited.

      Perhaps another study should be done which compares the amount of moonlight penetrating the atmosphere, and the incidents of animal excitedness. Just an idea, but perhaps you'll find that you get more bites when it's a clear sky out, and they can see the full moon.

      --
      - passion
    5. Re:Don't trust the skeptics... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I sure hope you were refering to the Darwinists when you said "our evolution". Otherwise, you'd be imposing your beliefs on the rest of us, many of whom want nothing to do with "Darwinism."

  23. What not to do tonight by imrdkl · · Score: 0
    • Hate
    • Fear
    • Abuse
    • Suspect
    • Ignore
    • Intolerate

    Lets give it a break for a night, and see how it feels. Toilet papering someones house is still probably OK, I would hope. But, and as always, only when the candy is not forthcoming.

    1. Re:What not to do tonight by reverius · · Score: 3, Funny

      My (very religious) friend told me today that it's Martin Luther day for Lutherans.

      I suggested that he should go trick-or-treating; as a "trick", if people don't give him candy, he could nail the 95 theses to their door.

    2. Re:What not to do tonight by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      hahaha!

      You fucking jerkoff. Shut up.

  24. Problem with the pumpkin by Migelikor1 · · Score: 2

    I wonder if the pumpkin computer overheats. After all, it's components are kinda GUI, er...I mean gooey. I wonder if seed slime lubricates the hard drive? Those boys need more to do.

    --
    My Karma is so good, I'm the Dalai Lama...or something.
  25. Tux-o-lantern has to be mentioned! by Vic · · Score: 2, Informative

    Go to the Ottawa Canada Linux Users Group homepage, and check out the great Tux jack-o-lanterns linked at the top of the page!

    1. Re:Tux-o-lantern has to be mentioned! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
  26. Other creative ideas by Nate+Fox · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I was just too stoked to see this. Those wacky kids over at sCary's carved pumpkins the other night. The best, hands down, is the middle one here. I dont ever think I've ever seen a Thundercats logo in a pumpkin. Even better: shugaMom was the one who carved it.

  27. ^H^H^H by Ian+Peon · · Score: 1
    Make that, "...would NEVER be blue."


    ...damn itchy mouse finger...

  28. Seven Sisters Constellation at its highest point.. by cOdEgUru · · Score: 3, Funny

    Shamelessly stolen from yahoo..

    To make the superstitious even more jittery, a constellation associated with the some end-of-the-world beliefs will also be at the top of Wednesday night's sky.

    The Seven Sisters constellation, which looks like a small cluster of grapes, has long been a signal for the time of year to honor the dead - such as All Saints Day, Nov. 1.

    According to myth, the Seven Sisters constellation is at its highest point in the sky during a great calamity, possibly the biblical flood or the sinking of Atlantis. The Aztecs and Mayans believed it would be overhead at midnight on the night the world comes to an end, Horkheimer said.

    The Seven Sisters and the full moon will both be directly overhead at midnight, he said.

    .....

    I guess its time to tick off items from my Disaster Check list...

  29. CNN Loads much faster by Anml4ixoye · · Score: 3, Informative
    If you have the following added to your hosts file:

    127.0.0.1 toolbar.netscape.com
    127.0.0.1 ads.web.aol.com

    Just a friendly reminder!
    1. Re:CNN Loads much faster by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      A point you forgot to remember is that you need to make sure you have apache (or another webserver) running to service requests on localhost otherwise you'll get annoying dialog boxes "ads.web.aol.com can't be found!

      --
      Monkey on Toast

    2. Re:CNN Loads much faster by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How come no matter what I place in my /etc/hosts, the images still load? They're not in the cache (they're different every time). I tried killing and restarting inetd, bind, and all networking and the banner ads still loaded. My host.conf has order hosts,bind. Any ideas?

    3. Re:CNN Loads much faster by ..p · · Score: 1

      shh! don't tell anyone, but..

      http://robots.cnn.com gets rid of ads entirely. (although not all sections appear to be on that server)

      --
      ..p
  30. mac-o-lantern by Heem · · Score: 2

    The mac-o-lantern was cool, with the rear projection and all.. but I was hoping somone actually took an old mac, gutted it, carved it out and threw a candle in there. THAT would have been cool

    --
    Don't Tread on Me
  31. What I did this halloween by Fjord · · Score: 1, Insightful

    When I went out of my building at work, I saw a black cat. Of course I went up to it and started to pet it. When my wife arrived in the car to pick me up, I went to grab it. You see, there are some sickos in this country (and not just this country) that will see a black cat on hallowe'en and kill it or perform other forms of torture.

    One hour later, we got it into the car. Now we're setting up a living space for it for the night. We've named it "Ween".

    --
    -no broken link
    1. Re:What I did this halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Suck my ween and I'll give you $2. Thanks.

      Your Pal,
      Jon Katz

    2. Re:What I did this halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      if you own a black cat, gaurd it well on halloween, for some well meaning ignoramouse may just up and steal the thing

  32. Blue Moon by ekephart · · Score: 0

    Once in a blue moon there is a second full moon in one month's time. The CNN article failed to mention it but here is a Halloween Blue Moon calendar type-thing.

    does anyone have an algorithm to determine if and when a blue moon will occur?

    --
    sig
  33. My Halloween costume by Macrobat · · Score: 1
    I'm posting this from work. My costume consists of:

    one long-sleeved, button-down shirt

    one pair of beige trousers

    one pair of cotton briefs

    one pair of black socks

    one pair of burgundy leather shoes

    --in short, I'm dressed as someone who gives a fsck.

    --
    "Hardly used" will not fetch you a better price for your brain.
    1. Re:My Halloween costume by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow, you're my fucking hero. Go drown yourself in a bucket of rancid pig shit, you waste of sperm.

    2. Re: My Halloween costume by Inthewire · · Score: 1

      Really? I took the opportunity to wear a bandana and earrings. I came as myself. I wish I could do that every day.

      --


      Writers imply. Readers infer.
    3. Re:My Halloween costume by SAFH · · Score: 1

      Although my post-work Halloween sucked ass (something about putting a nail through your foot 24hrs before Halloween makes going dancing, walking, or anything a bit difficult) my time at work was fun. I put on an old bright orange jumpsuit I had custom made, on the front left above the pocket it had my name written out in block letters, and on the back "CYOTE FLATS FEDERAL PRISON."

      I decided to test my luck and go to the DMV after work, no problems. Passed over a dozen police, no problems. Went into a gas station, no problems. Pump gas, no problems. Sit outside at a park bench and smoke a cigarette while looking at the moon, get interrogated, hand cuffed, and thrown in the back of a cop car while he runs my ID. Hows that for ironic?

      I'll have to put on my leg shackles, hand cuffs, and go rolling around in the dirt before I go out next year.

      --

      I cannot confirm nor deny the allegation or allegations you may or may not have just made

  34. Gimp-O-Lantern by frantzdb · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This was last year but it turned out pretty nicely: Gimp-O-Lantern.

    --Ben

  35. *Sweet* Looking TRON Contume! by chris_oat · · Score: 1

    Check out this Tron constume! Now that is a cool thing to wear every day, not just Halloween ;) Turns out that megarad.com is actually a pretty cool site.

    1. Re:*Sweet* Looking TRON Contume! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Damn he was *so* close. He should've just gone that extra step further with the foam pad outfit and it would have been *really* cool. He just looks like an idiot in that t-shirt.

    2. Re:*Sweet* Looking TRON Contume! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Makes me wish I made one first, you just have to love TRON. Plus, megarad is a sweet site.

    3. Re:*Sweet* Looking TRON Contume! by lunadude · · Score: 1

      Holy Neon Batman!

  36. 2365 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Not saying much for a /. effect is it... everybody must be out molesting little 'witches' and 'frankensteins' or something. Dirty old geeks. Not the moderators of course, they are a sign of pure virtue and golden light from heaven...

  37. It's a Rotten Halloween... by gabriel_aristos · · Score: 2, Funny

    Don't forget the lovely and talented jack-o-lanterns up for display on Rotten.com.

    -j

    --
    Torg, come out of the spaceship. Nothing can stop Torg.
    1. Re:It's a Rotten Halloween... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Heh, that first one was great.

      Now you have me looking at Rottem.com again, you b*stard. Collision with a Train - mmmmmm oh baby. That Donutland one is so true - fat greedy pigs.

  38. USNA Halloween by mlh1996 · · Score: 1

    Actually, Halloween is quite a big deal at the Naval Academy. Decorating contests, a costume parade, upperclass trick-or-treating at the plebes' rooms.

    You have to remember that these guys don't get to relax quite like their civilian counterparts. When you take the pressure off, things get pretty wild.

    --
    Lack of creativity is no excuse for not having a .sig
    1. Re:USNA Halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hope the plebes' are smart enough to have plenty of M&M's and snickers bars to hand out.

  39. BEIGE HAHAHAHAHA! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Beige Boy! Beige Boy!

    You are the beige trouser boy!

    Bbb EeeE Iii Ggg eEee
    b B e I G e
    Bbb eeE I G ggG eEE
    B B E i g g e
    bBb eeEE iIi GgGg eeeE

    Beige beige fish beige bloody lameness filter written by beige trousered beige boys.

  40. Go get laid by bonch · · Score: 0

    Letting yourself get worked up over the celebration of a fun little holiday like Halloween has gotten the better of you. Were you born an adult?

    Lighten up! People like you tend to not have very many friends, because you take things more seriously than Denzel Washington.

    - bonch
    stay animated

  41. Anybody else spot the pir8 near the mac-o-lantern? by TheMidget · · Score: 1

    Load the image into the gimp, and turn brightness+contrast all the way up...

  42. Blue Moon *not* Oct 31, 2001 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Please see Nasa for the *correct* information. Tonight is the night before a full moon as the *actual* full moon is on November 01,2001 and November 30,2001
    http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/phase/phas es .2001-2100.html
    Sorry to pop your bubble boys!

  43. Blue Moon by JungleBoy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Now days we call the 2nd full moon in a calender month a blue moon. But that was not the original definition.

    Usually a season has 3 full moons, the last one often being called the harvest moon. On occasion, a season has 4 full moons. The last moon in the season is still the harvest moon. The 3rd full moon in a season with 4 full moons is the Blue Moon.

    You can find this history in Sky and Telescope

    --
    "You never know when some crazed rodent with cold feet might be running loose in your pants."
    -Calvin
  44. Alan Cox possessed my pumpkin! by elanda · · Score: 2, Funny

    After carving my pumpkin last night, a friend noticed that it strongly resembled one famous kernel hacker: http://www.xeme.com/~elanda/pumpkin/possessed.html

  45. Happy Halloween from Donald Rumsfeld by mr_don't · · Score: 1

    Now who would have guessed that Donald Rumsfeld would as THIS for Halloween!!??



  46. WOOHOO! by shayne321 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Its not just a full moon, its also a blue moon

    I'm often said to only get laid one in a blue moon... Hot sex for me tonight! YAY!

    Shayne

    --
    Today I didn't even have to use my AK; I got to say it was a good day -- Icecube
  47. Halloween quote by Legion303 · · Score: 1
    "I'm dressed like a serial killer. They look just like everyone else." -- Wednesday, _The Addams Family_ movie (paraphrased, no need to rush in with a 5-page discourse on how I misquoted it).

    -Legion

  48. Back in the consulting days.. by jamesneal · · Score: 1, Funny

    Back when I was a consultant-for-hire, I worked service contracts for about a couple dozen different companies in Oregon City, Oregon. It's one of the oldest cities in Oregon, and one of the poorest, which meant crawling around attics, pulling cable, and doing other miscellaneous grunt work (SGI support :) in some VERY old buildings.

    Well, we had one particularly nasty company under contract in one of the older buildings("The Historic Myers Building", used to be a hospital), built in the 1890s. Plaster walls (that are a BITCH to cut through), pneumatic mail tubes, etc.

    This customer was a structural engineering house, and had folks working in there at all hours of the day and night. As such, we tended to get calls in the wee hours of the morning. It was okay.. I was typically up pretty early in the morning myself. I grumbled about it to my boss, but didn't care much..

    ..Until one night in 1994 that SCARED THE HELL out of me.

    I got a support call at about 3 in the morning from one of the engineers. They were having network trouble, and none of their machines were actually on the network and functional. So I hopped in the car and drove down to take a look..

    We had just recently upgraded their network from crappy 10Base2 to super-cool 10BaseT in a pretty big contract for us at the time, and which involved wiring the whole building, using the pneumatic tube system as wiring tunnels, and using the diverter room as a wiring closet.

    So after talking with the engineer who placed the call, and seeing that his office switch didn't even have network link, I headed to the diverter room, a dank, poorly lit little room in the basement.

    It was pretty obvious just from the smell that something was wrong in there. STRONG ozone odor. Crap. There had been a fiasco only a couple of months previous where something similar had happened because of condensation on the network cables dripping into the network ports. We'd rearranged the wires a bit to make that less likely, but I'd figured that's what had happened again. So I unplugged the (dead) equipment, took note of the model numbers, and turned around to head home, where I'd order new ones in the morning.

    Well, as I turned around to leave, I saw (and this is where it gets freaky, kids), this guy standing a few feet from the door, facing the wall.

    Not PARTICULARLY scary, but a little unsettling. So I laugh nervously, and ask the guy if I can help him. He jumped at the sound of my voice and slowly turned around. There was something seriously messed up about this guy. His eyes were a jet black (like, no whites), and his skin was seriously mottled, like he had bad acne scars or something. He tilted his head slightly to the side and, well, I can only describe it as UNHINGED his jaw, and made this horrible, TERRIBLE scratchy gurgling hissing sound. Shit.

    Now it's 4 in the morning, I'm heavily sleep deprived, in an enclosed space, and someone I don't recognize is acting strange in ways I didn't think were humanly possible is standing VERY near to the door.

    So I basically freaked out. I bolted through the doorway and at the stairs. As I rounded the first corner, I saw him chasing after me, his jacket spread out from the wind in a truely frightening pose, all the while making that horrible hissing/gurgling sound. When I reached the stairs, I was running so fast I missed the first step and hit my shin pretty badly on the next one. He was a lot closer than I thought because that's all the delay it took for him to grab hold of my leg.

    I screamed and kicked and tried to pull myself away from him but he had a FIRM grip on my leg. He pulled me by the leg back down the stairs, and pulled my by the leg towards the diverter room. Just like I'm pulling your leg now.

    Thank you, thank you very much.

    1. Re:Back in the consulting days.. by Unstablist · · Score: 0

      Just so you know, for doing that I know have to kill you and devour your soul.
      -The easily scared Unstablist

      --
      Maniacal Advantage A comic hosteed on Keenspace.
    2. Re:Back in the consulting days.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Er.. I think you want the "Ghost Stories" story, four stories down.

    3. Re:Back in the consulting days.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The unhinged jaw...the hissing...the chasing...
      Hell, if you threw in demonic laughter coming from the walls and the ceiling, I'd say you were dealing with a Microsoft sales rep. Imagine have three of those guys on you...scary!

  49. The History of Halloween by Ryu2 · · Score: 1

    Our Pilgrim forefathers well knew of Halloween's occultic roots. In fact they banned celebrating Halloween in America. Halloween was not celebrated in this country until 1845. At that time multiplied thousands of Irish emigrants flooded into New York because of the Irish Potato Famine of 1845-46. They brought with them the old Druid holiday of Halloween. Gradually celebrating this day spread throughout the rest of the country.

    Now, to understand Halloween better we must go even further back. I found that the original celebration was not called by its present name, Halloween. But, it began long before Christ among the ancient Celtic peoples (Britons, Gauls, Scots, Irish). They observed the end of summer with sacrifices to SAMAN (Shamhain). He was "the lord of death and evil spirits". This marked the beginning of the Celtic New Year.

    A Note About Saman

    Depending on your source material, the Druid lord of death and evil spirits was called Saman, Samana, Shamhain or Samhain. His "holiday" was called "The Vigil Of Saman" or Samhain (pronounced so-wein). You probably have seen a modern day version of SAMAN without even knowing it. This pagan god was shown as a ghostly, skeleton holding a sickle in his hand. He later came to be known as THE GRIM REAPER.

    More About the History of Samhain (Halloween)

    Ralph Linton in his book Halloween Through the Centuries, says "The American celebration (of Halloween) rests upon Scottish and Irish folk customs which can be traced in a direct line from pre-Christian times. The earliest celebrations were held by the DRUIDS in honor of Shamhain, lord of death, whose festival fell on November 1st."

    Searching other sources, I have this information to add: The Celts considered November 1st as being the day of death because the leaves were falling, it was getting darker sooner and temperatures were dropping. They believed Muck Olla, their sun god, was loosing strength because Samhain, lord of death, was overpowering him. Further, they believed that on October 31st Samhain assembled the spirits of all who had died during the previous year. They had been confined to inhabit animals' bodies for the past year as punishment for their evil deeds. On the eve of the feast of Samhain, October 31st, they were allowed to return to their former homes to visit the living. Supposedly to protect these people, Druid priests led the people in diabolical worship ceremonies in which horses, cats, black sheep, oxen, human beings and other offerings were rounded up, stuffed into wicker cages and burned to death. This was done to appease Samhain and keep the spirits from harming them.

    The Druids

    Who were the DRUIDS? They were occult practitioners, witches of sorts. In the century preceding the birth of Christ, Caesar conquered the Britains and he records very carefully the account of the DRUID PRIESTS (early witches)..."All Gallic nations are much given to superstition...they either offer up men as victims to the gods, or make a vow to sacrifice themselves. The ministers in these offerings are the Druids, and they hold that the wrath of the immortal gods can only be appeased, and man's life redeemed, by offering up human sacrifice, and it is a part of their national institutions to hold fixed solemnities (Ceremonies) for this purpose."

    I looked deeper to see if I could find the dates of these "fixed solemnities." In the series edited by Richard Cavendish called, Man, Myth and Magic it says, in volume 6, page 720, "...the pagan Celts in Northern Europe held two great fire festivals each year -- Beltane on the eve of 1 May and Samhain on the eve of 1 November -- to mark the beginning of summer and winter." I also came across an article written by Robert Graves in the Daily Telegraph Magazine, May 21, 1965. Graves said the fixed worship days are the "cross- quarterly days-Candlemas (February 2nd), May Eve (April 30th), Lammas (August 1st) and Halloween (October 31st).

    When they got together on these pagan worship days they would meet in a grove of trees (preferably oak trees) or in a Druidic stone circle, the most famous surviving circle being located in Stonehenge, England. It is evident that human sacrifice was common at this ancient Druid Sacrificial Circle because within three miles of this sight there are over 350 funeral mounds that contain the remnants of countless human sacrifices.

    Holiday researcher George Douglas adds some interesting information when he says "Many of Halloween's customs are derived from the ancient Baal Festivals. Other customs originate from the taking of omens from the struggles of victims in the fires of druidic sacrifices." (From: The American Book of Days, by George William Douglas revised by Helen Douglas Compton).

    Alexander Hislop in his book, The Two Babylons, says, "The god whom the Druids worshipped was Baal, as the blazing Baal-fires show --- We know that they offered human sacrifices to their bloody gods. We have evidence that they made `their children pass through the fire to Molech', and that makes it highly probable that they also offered them in sacrifice; for, from Jeremiah 32:35, compared with Jeremiah 19:5, we find that these two things were parts of one and the same system." Further, it is to be noted that the "priests of Nimrod or Baal were necessarily required to eat of the human sacrifices; and thus it has come to pass that `Cahna-Bal', (Cahna is the emphatic form of Cahn which means `a priest') meaning the priest of Baal, is the established word in our tongue for a devourer of human flesh." (from The Two Babylons, Hislop. See page 232).

    Though the name of their gods were changed Hislop believes that the Druids practices were rooted in Baal worship, which is condemned in the Bible.

    There Are Still Druids Today

    According to Robert Graves, there are still Druid practitioners around today. In fact, members of one surviving coven in Somersetshire, England still carry small blue tattoos pricked below a particular finger joint made from woad (an Old World plant with leaves that yield a blue dye) as did ancient Druids. You will still find Druids meeting at Stonehenge this Halloween symbolically carrying out their grotesque sacrifices. Although they claim no longer to practice human sacrifices they are one group responsible for keeping the occultic celebration of Halloween before the media. The followers of the Druids pagan religion are common in the USA too. A woman called me and told me a group going around to Milwaukee, Wisconsin area libraries presenting a program to children which dealt with their heritage. She engaged one in a conversation afterwards and found that he claimed to be a druid priest who practiced the "old religion."

    The Pathetic Paradox of Christians Celebrating Halloween

    It's no wonder that a onetime witch of our day, Tom Sanguinet, former high priest in the Celtic tradition of Wicca (witchcraft) said, "Halloween is purely and absolutely evil, and there is nothing we ever have or will do that would make it acceptable to the Lord Jesus."

    Owen Rachleff amplifies this when he wrote, "Halloween can be, and to many is, a deadly serious affair. [It] originated with pre-Christian Druids or Celts in Northern Europe, who marked the year by four seasonal festivals. The autumn feast took place on November 1st. Early Christians, desiring a part in the traditional festivities, created All Saints' Day to coincide with the pagan rites. Satanists--acting true to form--reversed the Christian procedure. Because November 1st was All Saints' Day (All Souls' Day, November 2nd, memorializes the dead), Satanists established October 31st as and "All Demon's Night." As surely as the Christian martyrs and saints dominated their own holiday, so did the demons permeate the preceding evening. All Hallows' Eve predictably became a time of spells, curses, and horrors for those who did not believe, but for the Satanists, particularly the witches, it was a joyous festival and major sabbat. So it remains in a diluted form, ironically celebrated by Christian society far more vigorously than All Saints' Day." (Quoted from The Occult Conceit - A New Look at Astrology, Witchcraft and Sorcery, by Owen S. Rachleff, from page 189-190.)

    Historically, Halloween is obviously and totally a pagan, occultic worship day. There is NOTHING Christian about the day. Pause for a moment. Dig beneath the candy. What is the primary focus of Halloween, even in our day? I see a three fold focus... 1) DEATH 2) FEAR & HORROR 3) EVIL, THE DEVIL & THE OCCULT. There is absolutely NO Christian significance to be found in Halloween.

    Modern Day Occult, Witchcraft and Satanism Celebrate Halloween

    You need to understand that even today Halloween is STILL an occult worship day. Phil Phillips says in his book, Halloween and Satanism, "...Halloween is a day witches celebrate above all other days."

    Is there any support for Phil's statement? Yes! "The Maine State Prison allowed members of a witch coven (the Coven of Dawn) to hold a two-hour service on the feast day they call Samhain [Halloween], after the Druidic festival of year's end. `This is our time to give praise to our lord and lady for the bountiful harvest,' said the founder of the `goddess- oriented' coven. He said that 75 inmates have been initiated into the religion since its start in 1981." (This report is from Observations, 11/87 by way of the "What In The World!" information sheet.

    Turn your attention to the October 1989 issue of the Baptist Bulletin magazine. It reported, in the "NEWS" section, "A U.S. Air Force physical therapist who says she has been a practicing witch for four years won permission to take Halloween and seven other days off as `religious holidays.' A spokesman at Lackland Airforce base in San Antonio said regulations require that Patricia Hutchins...be accorded the same freedom to express her religious beliefs as any other religious believer."

    Probably the best documentation as to whether modern day witches actually celebrate Halloween comes from their own testimony. When asked "Does anyone today celebrate Samhain (Halloween) as a religious Holiday?" a major witches' organization responded, "Yes, many followers of various pagan religions, such as Druids and Wiccans (witches), observe this day as a religious festival. They view it as a memorial day for their dead friends similar to the national holiday of Memorial Day in May. It is still a night to practice various forms of divination concerning future events. Also, it is a time to...initiate new projects." (from Cult Watch Response, October 1988, Vol. 1, No. 1).

    Witches and Satanists love Halloween. They get a lot of media coverage around that time of year. It's good P.R. (public relations) for them. That coverage usually portrays them in a favorable light. In addition, it generates interest in "the craft" and is good for recruitment purposes. As Craig Hawkins put it, "...with increasing vigor, witchcraft is coming `out of the broom closet.' Many witches are actively seeking public understanding and acceptance." (quote from an article in Christian Research Journal; Winter/Spring 90 entitled "The Modern World of Witchcraft" by Craig S. Hawkins.)

    Despite the public relations campaign to "sell" the public on the "virtues" of witchcraft, modern day witches and Satanists still worship demon gods & goddesses, practice bizarre & immoral sexual rituals, and certain groups offer animal and human sacrifices.

    Noted New Age Researcher Texe Marrs said this about the activities of witches on Halloween. "...our own research confirms that on this unholy night [Halloween], witches' covens meet, drink, dance, spit out curses and spells, conjure up spirits, engage in sexual orgies, induct new members, and offer up animal and human sacrifices. (Witches have become expert at covering up these sacrifices by use of cremation ovens and the use of privately owned land preserves for disposal of bodies in deeply dug graves.)" He goes on to say, "Somewhere in America in the week prior to this coming Halloween, children will be kidnapped by witches and become statistics as `missing children.' ...While chances of your children being snatched may be remote, never the less we believe caution and good judgment is in order."

    Jack Roper, occult researcher with C.A.R.I.S. (Christian Apologetics: Research & Information Service) says "...the time of the year where you have the highest rate of Satanic ritual crimes is Halloween."

    Jack also said, "Around Halloween, one of the things you see are graveyard desecrations." Self-styled Satanists use human bones in their rituals. Graveyard vandalism is a common Halloween occurrence.

    At this point, I want to share with you some more "Halloween crimes" I am acquainted with.

    A Milwaukee county park worker contacted me in 1989. He told me of finding numerous remains of small animals that had been sacrificed in area parks around Halloween. It was clear that these sacrifices were occult related because the remains were associated with either an altar, inside a circle, triangle or pyramid structure. That's not all.

    While deer hunting in Marinette County, Wisconsin, I came across the remains of a bull that had been sacrificed within a stone circle. It is almost certain that this was part of a Halloween ritual sacrifice performed by a Satanic group.

    Dave Benoit tells of a mother finding a strange diary, called "The Book Of Shadows" in her son's room. She with fear and trembling leafed through pages filled with Satanic drawings. Then her eyes fell on these horrifying words, "Last year I stole a car at Halloween and ran over a kid and killed him. This year, at Halloween, I plan to do the same thing!" The words in his satanic diary proved to be true. The teenager is now incarcerated. He murdered a kid as a sacrifice to Satan.

    Halloween is an evil day. Halloween honors Satan, idol worship, immorality, demonic rituals and human sacrifice. Halloween is not a day I want to celebrate because of what it has stood for and what it stands for today. Jack Roper put it simply enough, "You would never see Jesus at a Halloween party. Halloween parties in churches are an abomination [to the Lord]."

    I no longer promote or participate in Halloween activities because of its association with idolatry, immorality, bizarre rituals and human sacrifice. The Bible warns us, "...the things which the Gentiles sacrifice, they sacrifice to devils, and not to God: and I would not that ye should have fellowship with devils." (I Corinthians 10:20). That is why I am exposing the day for what it really is, SATAN'S DAY!

    --
    There's 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
    1. Re:The History of Halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I hope you're not serious. I'm Pagan and am celebrating tonight the holiday of Samhain. I've never once killed anybody, worshipped Satan, or done any such bad thing. I do, however, make a bitchin cup of tea.

    2. Re:The History of Halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nice effort, but I believe that the moderators have already seen too much of this style flame-bait to be fooled.

      Better luck next time.

    3. Re:The History of Halloween by Draxos+(PB) · · Score: 1

      Nice fundermentalist rant, no really at least you actually went to the trouble of quoting sources (biased sources but what the hell). However a few key points you left out 1. Samhain is decended from celtic practices which occured a very very long time ago (~ 4BC and earlier). While this may not sound that bad bear in mind the celts had a extensive oral history and did not leave written records so anything we know about them ammounts pretty much to hearsay, rumor and propoganda. 2. Sacrafice (Human and otherwise) While i admit this probably did occur (the romans at least generally disapproved of human sacrafice in religious rituals) the context is important. Most early cultures lacked a seperation between church and state so sacrafices where often a type of criminal punishment. Likewise volantory sacrafice can be veiwed in a similar vein to martyrdom and other such religius practices. As for animal sacrafice theres little differance between sacraficing it to a god or sacraficing it to your stomach. 3. Modern Vs Ancient Religion. Religions change constantly bits fall in and out of style, things get made up. Most modern pagan celtic movements have as little similarity with their origins as modern protestantism, evangelism or catholisim has with early christianity. (before responding to this do a quick search on Gnostics, the Nicine Creed (possible sp) ,or the Apocrypha. There interesting isn't it) Hope this wan't to much flamebait but I felt htis needed a decent response.

    4. Re:The History of Halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      Nice fundermentalist rant, ...

      ...and not any worse that the Pagan/Wiccan rants we see on /.

  50. This is a first... by MAXOMENOS · · Score: 2
    A pumpkin with more brains *after* it was jack-o-lantern'd than *before* it was jack-o-lantern'd.

    It would have been even more hillarious if he turned it a quake server for halloween-theemed quake...although I don't know if you can get away with that in a military school.

  51. My lizard bit my son tonight... by rd · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    True story. My son wanted to see his new lizard (a Columbian Tegu) and he got too close and it bit his nose. No blood, just scard him.

  52. Nekkid chicks by justletmeinnow · · Score: 1

    What are you talking about? It sounds like You are the one that makes it not fun. There's plenty of *adult* costume parties out there with seriously hot women all dressed up. Go find one of those, if you can't find one host one... and tell me where it's at!

    --
    Just because I AM paranoid doesn't mean they're NOT out to get me.
    1. Re:Nekkid chicks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Heh... You sound like the drug addict in Better Off Dead.

  53. I got a VERY SCARY true story. by t0qer · · Score: 1

    It's completely unrelated to geeks, but I think /.r's are going to want to hear about it.

    My wife works as a webmaster for a local VA (veterans affairs) hospital. Today she was tasked to make a video on radiation poisining so the doctors can train. Apparantly the head VA hospital heard that the taliban has 5 suitcase sized nuclear bombs in the USA. I'm not sure where they heard that from, but VA is a ol boys club, i'm sure their source was reliable.

    Now that is scary.

    1. Re:I got a VERY SCARY true story. by t0qer · · Score: 1

      now that i think about it, its a scary story from my webmaster wife, its true even if you don't believe me. I'm seriously not trying to troll here.

  54. somber Halloween by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Halloween was always my favorite holiday, but after 9/11 it was irrelevant this year. Only a few people in our neighborhood bothered to decorate this year and the number of kids going around was less then half of years past. I wonder if things will ever return to normal.

  55. No, moron by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    To have to events (separate by 28 days) inside of a 31 day month would require the first one to occur _before_ the 4th.

    1. Re:No, moron by FreshFromTheCows · · Score: 0

      hmm, I would like to point out that you spelt two wrong lol... not to, but two! I know I know, But I had to :)

  56. Someone mod this fool down. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is beyond trolling.

  57. Jack o' Windows by come_sucker · · Score: 0

    Hollow with a crappy facade that reflects the true face of its creator. No wait, what was I trying to describe again?

  58. Jack o' Windows by death_denied · · Score: 1

    Hollow with a crappy facade that reflects the true face of its creator. No wait, that's Windows!

  59. Gimp g1mp gimp g1mp (damn lameness filter) by Dr.+Awktagon · · Score: 2

    I wonder how many times he had to explain just what the hell this is supposed to be.

    Actually, I'm not sure what type of thing the Gimp is, myself. What is it and why does it grin so? And where's its body?

    And what's with the blue seamless paper and light boxes used in those photographs? Geeks are supposed to use cheap digital cameras with glaring flashes, with a stack of Jolt cans in the background.

    1. Re:Gimp g1mp gimp g1mp (damn lameness filter) by WWWWolf · · Score: 1
      Actually, I'm not sure what type of thing the Gimp is, myself. What is it and why does it grin so? And where's its body?

      Wilber the Gimp is the mascot of GNU Image Manipulation Program, created by tigert.

      Not really a dog or a fox or a wolf or anything. It's just a cute creature.

      And don't ask where the body is. Original Wilber drawings only had the head anyway...

  60. Who is PI? by The+Pi-Guy · · Score: 1

    http://www.joshuawise.com/ I AM PI!! :-D True geek... :D --joshua

  61. full moon, just a storm.. I guess.. by Sarin · · Score: 1

    When I was young me a brothers defaced everything my parents had every full moon or every coming storm. I can still see the empty faces of my parents knowing a storm was ahead.

    I swear it works this way. I even know the lyrics of song I thought my little brothers:

    "Alles in de wind, alles in de wind, daar liep een schipperskind"

  62. Military School by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Ouch, wonder what this poor soul did in order to get sent to military school.

    Prolly too much time in front of the computer, fraggin' mo-fo's and too many hours in the basement playing D&D. 'Rents were worried 'bout those dee-monic influences and violent tendenices.

    Solution? Military School! Poifect....

  63. I made a Mac Pumpkin by adpowers · · Score: 1

    My family was late with halloween this year. We didn't get our pumpkins until like 1700 (5 PM) on Halloween. The only reason I asked my parents to take me to the store to get a pumpkin is so I could build the mac-o-lattern. We have had just a few trick-or-treaters (like 15 groups), but one of the Moms said that my Mac-O-Latterns was one of the best pumpkins she had seen tonight. I don't think she knew that it was the mac symbol. I should have told her that, anything to bring the common folk away from Windoze.

  64. Halloween is dead by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    and the ignorant zealots killed it.

    I'm christian, and I'm pro-halloween (kind of like
    pro-"Government Does Not 0\/\/N me")

    What's up with my fellow Christians. When I was in high school 2 years ago, everyone (even in HS) dressed up and acted stupid/silly (`cause that's what halloween is all about). Now I'm in college, home with my folks. We used to get 100's of trick or treaters, we got four tonight and 12 last year (I know there are still lots of kids in the neighborhood). Not to mention there weren't really any costume parties, just a few stupid-imitation "Fall Festivals".

    Doesn't this just piss you off?

  65. Humor 1/0 by Ecyrd · · Score: 2, Funny

    Today, I bought a bus ticket.

    The expiry date is 01.11.01 11.10.

    Of course, the purchase date was 01.11.01 10.10.

    I found this totally hilarious. Perhaps I should get out more often.

  66. Moderators are Idiots by Elbow+Macaroni · · Score: 0
    If I were a moderator I would score you a -3 for this entire thread being off-topic.

    Give me a break - Halloween stories? Geeze what's next an Oprah Winfry story about transexual eskimos on Halloween and how they feel about the attack on America?

    AOL just bought Slashdot didn't it? Don't lie to me, I can tell.

    --
    -------------------------------------
    Technically, we are beyond survival.
  67. My Little Penguin by Stickster · · Score: 1

    This is the costume that my wife made for my daughter, who's seven months old. Hopefully she'll be learning more about operating systems than your average CS grad student these days.... :-) (If that link doesn't work, try this one instead.)

    I told my wife she should be prepared to create a Tux-Costume-HOWTO depending on demand.

  68. Lame geek pumpkins by GW+Hayduke · · Score: 1

    Ok, not to tout my pumpkin carving ability... which is severely lacking, I just thought you guys might get a kick out of some of my "hacking" attempts.
    pumpkin 1

    pumpkin 2

    pumpkin4

    Yeah yeah,I know #3 is missing, but it's a bad picture. also only 4 people out of 750 got the jokes on my street, but there is hope for the future, my 4-year old and all her friends loved the 1st one most of all :)

    --
    -- Life: Hate the Game... Love the cereal
  69. also a Hunter's Moon by mrsmalkav · · Score: 1

    a Hunter's Moon is the first moon following a Harvest Moon.

  70. MSN? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This is Halloween... MSN only appeared when the film was developed...