I have paper mached another skull, very awesome looking I might add, and want to have a body with this one but having trouble creating that part. The head is heavy with the neck attached but I will just keep persavering until I figure the damn thing out. It is so HOT outside I haven't been able to do much. We are hoping to get relief soon. Maybe then I can get the ball rolling again on the prop part of my life.

I have also been kicking around ideas for the party area. I always have to decorate some there too. I finally settled on a quote with Alarming Products for 2 masks and a head prop. When I get paid on the 31st I plan on ordering them. There is also several things in ABC which I want to get and decorate with mainly these two:

http://www.abcdistributing.com/home/catalog/cat_item_pg.asp?P=4&G=347

I can always figure a place for something like them.

Halloween Forum has started up a place called SinisterSpace and I have joined there. As usual I am unable to figure out uploading pics and stuff. My pics are too big and I can't figure out how to downsize them to fit into anything. I'll keep trying maybe get some pointers later from Empress or Deathtouch.

I have recently found the book "I Am Legend"  by Richard Matheson and this is the picture on the front cover. I was hard to see on the book but this picuture is awesome! Scary stuff...

I received the best compliment from my son-in-law this weekend. We had a big fish fry in the garage where I am working on alot of props. Someone made a comment about the skeletons, heads, etc. and Tim said, "that's just my mother-in-law, she's the Queen of Darkness." I really liked that one and appreciated it in a way most people, other than other haunters, would never understand.

Paper mached a beauty salon head last evening, we will see how it turns out for the spider victim props. I think they can be used.

Also about 8:45PM when Jacob and I had went up to get ready for bed (Tim working) I heard a knock on the door. I figured it was my brother Darius, no, I got a treat, FED EX had delivered my 3 new skulls from ACC and now I can start paper maching them and working on a prop or two for the graveyard. It's the small things in life ya know, ACC skulls, etc....

I am now back from vacation and back at work. I am not sure one could call what I just went through a "vacation" with all the house cleaning, cooking and large number of family in and out of the house. But I wasn't at work, I could sleep in and spend time with Jacob and also able to work on props and work out more trail ideas.

I completed the neck and head for Johnny Appleseed, thanks to John at Pumpkinrot and Mark--Deathtouch, I think he turned out great. I will posts pics as soon as I have him mounted. Tim is supposed to help finish that out this weekend. I stained my Bart and he turned out good too. I didn't take the time to "corpse" him but I bet I could if I tried. In the words of Cousin Gage who helped, "they look wicked awesome!" I thought so too. I was also able to drag out alot of things stored and was able to figure out what props I already had, what I need to buy, etc. I also decided to keep my charity the March of Dimes and not change this year like I did last year.

Next thing I am going to start working on is the spider victims. I am going to try and paper mache a head I received from a local beauty salon. I think I could possibly make the heads into a prop piece for the spider victim then wrap it in the comforter lining to look like bodies in spider webbing. I am thinking about purchasing a hand that moves by battery to be in one webbing to look as if the person is still alive. Gross huh?

Still working on uniforms. I took Gage to Ft. Donelson and while there finished buying my Union and Confed hats for the scareactors. We had an excellent day for exploring and tried to get a few ideas from what was there. I believe the trail needs just some fine tuning. I am sending copies of everything to Damon for finalizing all the details (if possible.) Time is winding down and I am trying to get things bought and made as much as possible so the expense won't be so bad in October. Of course the food expense and all the etcs. are bad no matter what. Soon to start planning the party area and food. More later...Peace...

I have neglected my Blogcrypt long enough! 

Every so often, I will write happenings and going ons in my Myspace Blog, but I feel as thought this is the place that I can truly put down what is going on and not just on the outside, but on the inside, as well.

With that said, here's what's happening....

First off, I'm feeling so much better!  As long as I take my iron and eat liver occassionally , I'm okay.  Yeah, I eat too much junk, consume too much salt and suck up too much alcohol, but just as soon as I can get this season's haunt under my belt, I'm going to start treating my body better.  At least, that's what I keep telling myself and promising my 14yr old son.  We're (me and my two sons) are planning on taking our first vacation together during the week of Thanksgiving.  We've spoken of Disneyworld and even received their DVDs on what they have to offer and how to go about planning your vacation.  But, there's something that just doesn't sit right with me on being there.  It just doesn't seem like a REAL vacation to me.  I'll have to come back home to rest after being there, I just know it.  After this season is over, I'm gonna need to relax and be pampered and catered to instead of it being the other way around.  I've thought about taking a cruise, but I'm not sure how my little Emilio would fair on one.  To cast all doubts aside, I'm going to call my old travel agent, Francine from Galaxy Cruises and see what she has to say.  She has always directed me in the right direction.

Onward to Haunt Business....

All interviews and auditions are over.  At least the main ones.  We are still getting new people who want to be a part of the haunt.  Our 1st meeting last week had 13 people to show with six of them being new.  I just hand them an application with liability waiver and give a quick interview and they are good to go.  Our next meeting is this Saturday with more saying they'd like to join.  That's great since the more the merrier!  We have lots of ground to cover in this haunt and trail and that means lots of people.  Speaking of ground....

Last year, we had lots of room to work with in my backyard.  BUT THIS YEAR...we have THREE times as much!  Why?  Because there use to be a fence that seperated what I was using as a backyard and oodles of trees, bushes and what have you behind it.  Well, the fence has been torn down as well as all the trees.  That means we have just that much more room to play with.  And when I say "room" I mean an area large enough to put another three or four bedroom house WITH a front and backyard.

I've been pondering as to what to do with all this extra space since my current floorplan was drawn without knowing about the impending area.  Scenes like Jeepers Creepers 2 and the first part of the Dawn of the Dead remake popped in my head and that was when it hit me that I should park a bus back there.  After brainstorming with my sis, we thought the best place to find a bus would be through my niece's former school.  The owner of the school loved my niece (she passed away two days after this past Christmas ) and told my sister at her Memorial that if there was anything he could do to let him know.  Well, I gave him a call yesterday and he said he's going to help us get a bus.  HOORAY! 

Now comes the part of creating several powerful scares using the bus.  It shouldn't be much of a problem seeing as a good scare starts with a good prop and the bus within itself is enough to make folks panic.  I'm gonna have fun with this part of the haunted trail! 

BUT, there's still a great portion of the area left.  The ground on this portion is rather bumpy with tree roots and rock poking up from the ground.  Too dangerous for any customers to walk on, but......perfect for a graveyard!  I've never been one to really jump on the graveyard bandwagon, but the area, with it's ivy covering the surrounding back gate and sides of the shed next to it and the rough terrain cries out to be one.  I'll have to come up with an idea of a scare for this area.  But, again, the atmosphere lends itself to being scary, so it shouldn't be too difficult.

At our meeting this coming Saturday, we will be getting the cars and ourselves ready for our first appearance in a 4th of July parade.  I'm pretty excited about it and nervous at the same time.  I'm sure they've never had a haunt to participate in one of thier parades and I'm just wondering how we will be accepted.  We'll be throwing candy at the onlookers as well as passing out flyers, coupons and advertising postcards.  We also hope to scare a few, too!

I've been chatting with Kane Hodder, Jason Vorhees from Friday The 13th, off and on for several months.  He's an awesome man!  I thought that I might would be able to get a hockey mask out of him for our Yell Like Hell Screaming Contest, but  he sent us several autographed pictures instead..which is GREAT!  In fact, he and I are talking about bringing him here to our haunt in 2007!  Since we are planning on this being our last year here at this location and residing in a building, bringing him here would be great.  We will definitely have to look for a location with lots of parking since Kane is a huge public draw.

Well, even though I have lots more to write, my fingers are tired.  I will write again soon and give you the skinny on what else is happening with me and The Scream Extreme.

So, how's your day going so far?

Peace!

Got me two things I can use to make animated stuff  for this year's Halloween. The first one I've had for a few months. It's an old animated Santa ( 40's 50's ) that's in real bad shape. I saw one on Ebay just like it. Looked way better than the one I have. Mine has had all it's hair and beard replaced with stringy yarn and has major damage to the face. But the animation works. He's getting a makeonver. Last week I got one of those talking Douglas Firs. Going to do some research on the web and in the forum to see how to hack one of these.

Been way to busy with things to even think about making props. Hopefully by the end of the month things will settle down enough for me to get back in the thick of it.

Spent time this weekend working on my Johnny Appleseed and I am liking this paper maching. I believe I will order me a couple of more skulls and try to create some props for the trail. I plan on putting Johnny near the cook out where everyone can see him. Funny thing happened with my Johnny skull, I kept finding it in a couple of different places while it was drying out. I finally brought it in the house and somehow it ended up on the floor. Tim said, "that SOB is haunted already!" Weird.

Tim didn't get the corn planted and I am very disappointed about that so I have had to totally restructure the trail plan. I guess it is not as much work on me, which is a good thing, but that corn maze at the end would have been awesome! I will just have to move things around and place sites a little differently. I haven't gotten my Ancient Evil mask yet but my 2 Confederate battle flags are in. I was very happy with them. I will have to post them on something this weekend. I hope my buried Confederate uniform is molding nicely. I will see in October. Got the idea off of site Skull and Bone which is a pretty good one to check out.

Work continues to suck. That's all on that matter. Need to go, Tim and I are meeting with Jacob's physical therapist. More later...

Discovered this mask and it ties in with my theme I think, I am buying it today, it will be the last site on the tour:

...the 1st of the interviews for the 2006 season are over!

Five folks showed up and I liked every single one of them.

The guy that has a motor trike that says he wants to ride in the parade we're gonna be in on July 4th did not show up.  I was quite disappointed, but I'm hoping he will sign up for one of the other interview days on June 3rd or 4th.

If there is any indication how the haunt will be by the enthusiatism those that showed up had, WE ARE GONNA BE THE BOMB!

So, how was your day?

PEACE!

I was looking at someone's website the other day and noticed that they had created a group on Yahoo.  I'd thought of the idea of creating one myself before, but put it off as not having enough time.  But, after seeing this person's group and realizing that there needs to be a group such as the one I had in mind, I decided to give it a whirl.  So, introducing....

~Charity Haunted Attractions ~

Hello, Fellow Readers!

Can you tell I'm in a good mood?  Well, if you can you're right on because I'm feeling really confident about this season's haunt as you can tell by the subject of this blog.  Why am I so confident?  Well, let me lay it on ya...

First, for those of you who may not know, we're opening October 13th.  That's FRIDAY the 13th.  It's the last Friday the 13th in October for the next seven years and we didn't want to miss the opportunity of capitalizing on such a special day.  So, we have planned for opening night the one and only Yell Like Hell Screaming Contest!    Trust me when I say that there isn't another contest like this around.  It's not your ordinary screaming contest.  Besides being special within itself, the prizes sets it off from all other contest, as well.  Now, get this...  The top prizes are autographed memorabilia from Mr. Kane Hodder himself, better known as Jason from Friday the 13th!  WOOT!!   He has graciously donated items to our contest in hopes of bringing in more contestants to further our cause of helping the kids.  HECK...i outta enter the contest myself!  LOL!

Okay that's one piece of news down.  Here's another...

We have been invited to participate in the Carmichael's Gala Parade Celebration on July 4th!  Plans are already in the works to change my Ford Escort Wagon into an "Econo Hearse."  It will be carrying one of our Toepincher coffins in the back and will be all decked out to look like a mini hearse.  There will be monsters walking on both sides of the vehicle throwing candy and passing out flyers and coupons.  There will also be a motor trike driven by one of our actors decked out as the Grim Reaper.  We are gonna have sooo...Much..FUN!

And finally, the last piece of news....

Our baseball team here, The Sacramento Rivercats, agreed to let us attend their August 30th game...in costume!  This is the next to the last game so you KNOW it's gonna be packed.  The head of Marketing said that they can set a table up for us, we can walk around and pass out flyers and coupons PLUS..he said we can even do a small little skit with Dinger, the Mascot on the field!  Can I hear a "WOOT?!"   Dinger is scheduled to be here at the haunt on October 20th and this is a great tie into his appearance. 

We are gonna have so many folks here this season.  I'm almost scared that we may have TOO many people.  This will definitely be our last season here at this location as we will have outgrown it by the season's end.

I will keep you informed of any other developments that transpire.  At the rate things are going...I'll be writing again really soon!

So how's your day going...?

PEACE

I have updated the IE Halloween Toolbar at http://www.halloweentoolbar.com .

How many times can you get away with this? I know I'd aready be fired if I tried it.

I know I've ranted about our maintenaces before so yall should be used to it. LOL. We have a new 2nd in command at the factory. He didn't like the really trashy way the chemical area was kept so that's where he started his changes. His first day on the job he walked back to this area and saw a maintenance man smoking in arms reach of a NO SMOKING sign. Then he noticed that not a single barrel or container there was grounded. He told our maintenance department they had to clean the entire area. Floor to ceiling and took before and after pics. He showed these pictures to everyone. There in living color was a shot of the ceiling overhead. There in the center of the shot was a florescent light fixture, half cleaned. That's right folks. Only half of the fixture was over the area. And they didn't put the bulbs back in.

Three weeks ago we had a machine go down. A three inch by one half inch metal support got sheared in half. This part had to be hand made in Italy where the machine came from. Maintenance waited till they got this part to open the machine...to find out they needed more parts. This is the same machine they ordered an empty gear box to replace the gear box that went bad. The empty one was less expensive than the one with gears in it.

On 4/14/06 ( a few Fridays ago ) my machine when down. Bearings went out one a spindle. Maintenance waited till the spindle froze up before replacing it. It's the,

"Run it till it breaks"

routine. Come to find out the motor is going bad. The machine has run now for 2 weeks with a howling motor. By the time it dies the new spindle will be dead too.

Cutting was down for a shift and a half because two maintenance crews thought a motor burned up. All it was? a loose wire.

In our meeting with the new number two he asked for suggestions. I made the comment that machine operators should decide if a machine is working right and not maintenance. His exact words?

" That was a major problem in the factory I just came from. I know it's a real problem here."

Maybe some good change is in the wind.

 

Didn't do any prop work or studying on electrical works this week. Did toss around the idea of doing a food pantry charity haunt. Thought about it last year but didn't persue it.

I started updating the IE Halloween Toolbar.  There are a few new features that I intend on adding such as the ability to search multiple search engines/sites from the toolbar.  A couple of other features I do not want to mention yet as I am still working out the bugs.

Go ahead and install the IE Halloween Toolbar and it will automatically update once the new features are available.

Auctions are like yard sales with an MC....

I like auctions. They can be a lot of fun. I've learned some things about the process. Don't get caught up in a bidding fight. You get out bid you loose. You pay to much you still loose. And let me tell ya, it's easy to get caught up in a bidding war. And it goes FAST. You want it. The other person want's it. And the higher the price the more the auctioneer makes. Some things to learn to do,

One. Set limits and amounts on what you bid on and stick to them.

Two. Read the other bidders. How intent is or are they? The more bidders on a single item the faster the price goes up.

Three. On choice of 'lots' or 'per box' items. Check out what other people are looking at. Most folks will look at what their bidding on. If you don't think the boxes or lots you want are the same ones being bid on wait. Let them bid and pay for what they want. I've seen choice for boxes and lots go as high as $8.00. Folks would take what they want for that price wile the stuff I want is left. Then the next round of bidding goes. I've waited and got 'lots' ( an entire row or area of boxes or items) for $1.00. If what I wanted ends up selling before I bid I loose out. But that doesn't happen that often.

Four. Don't draw attention to what you plan on bidding on. You have no friends at an auction. Everyone is there to buy stuff. If your interested and talking about it, it has to be good.

Five. Don't buy things you don't need. We have 6 crock pots! My wife can't pass up a crock pot. We've never used the 3 pots we got from our wedding.( this makes 9 crock pots all together. LOL ) Deb likes percolator coffee pots too. She doesn't drink coffee. I don't drink coffee. We even have a 2 gal. percolator pot we don't use. LOL

And the most important?

Reputable auctioneers are worth their weight in gold. If they say it works it does.or they'll buy it back. That's the type of auctioneer I've been going to. He'll tell you what he's been told about the item. And make it right if he was fed a line.

This week I bought more items I intend on cannibalizing for Halloween. The biggie is an old computer for it's power supply and fan. Will have to post and ask how to take them out and what to use the power supply on. Bought more speakers too. I know, I have more speakers than what I know to do with now.  Haunt should have plenty of noises this year. LOL