I’m blogging tonight from my front porch.

All around me, adorable li’l Trick or Treaters are making the rounds with their dads, who are all wearing angry clown costumes.

Last year, I lamented that not enough kids showed up at the house. Still, though, I was sure to stock up on Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups and Kit Kats. I passed through a Halloween display at Kroger about a week ago and thought the right thing to do was buy more candy than I’d need.

Then, over the course of the next week, I ate the candy.

So today, I was rushing home from work, knowing I had to stop at the store for candy. Outside, the neighbors were set up on their porch by the time I got home. The kids were already afoot.

I went up to the neighbors and started chatting about how there’s totally more kids than last year.

“What are you talking about?!” they inquired. “There were tons of families! It’s a young neighborhood!”

I explained that few people came to my door.

“I can see why they’d stop at the next house up. The sidewalk ends past your house,” my neighbor analyzed. “But they should have at least gone this far up the–wait a minute. Came to your door?!”

Apparently in Texas, the tradition is to sit outside the house and have a party. If you’re not sitting on your porch, no one comes bangin’ on yer door like they’re trying to rob the place of your Kit Kats.

Back home in Ohio, I responded, I vaguely remember a couple years where it was snowing on Halloween (or, “Beggars’ Night,” because you totally weren’t allowed to ever go trick-or-treating on Halloween). Who’s gonna sit out on the porch and have a party when it’s snowing out?!

Wait, now that I think of it, there was a house down the street that did that exact thing. You got a hot dog! Not candy. A hot dog!

But you still had to ring door bells everywhere else. In preparation last year, I turned on the porch light. In Ohio, that means you’ve got candy. Then I went back inside.

Approximately four kids came to the door.

I explained this to the neighbor. In addition to being wrong for holing myself up in the house, he realized that Halloween was on a Saturday last year.

“Hey, that’s right!” I recalled. “I think I shut down right at 8 o’clock and went to some party!”

So this year, I stayed outside and, man, the kids are coming quick.

One li’l ragamuffin, upon receiving a Reese’s Cup, declared, “Thank you. I love you.”

I was not sure the appropriate response, so I patted him on the head and said, “Hey, Batman!”

Coming up the street, I heard a woman cry out when passing every other family, “Oh, how cute!”

They stayed on the other side of the street, though. What am I, like, not cute?!

Again, more kids are coming quick. A little too quick.

I felt like I had bought plenty of candy for the four kids who were going to come to my door, but since I actually went outside and joined the community, I realized I was going to run out of candy.

A couple of hours ago, I was incredibly pleased with myself for finding two bags of Reese’s products at the store on Halloween! Now, I wouldn’t just run out of candy, but I’d even have to give away the Reese’s I had stashed inside.

As part of the Lord’s ongoing master plan to inconvenience me, just as I was running out of candy, He brought upon me a giant group of several families.

I handed out what I could to the li’l scamps, but when I ran out, I had to explain the situation to a lot of disappointed children.

I slunk back inside (which is where I’m writing presently), thinking I could take advantage of this “always stay outside” custom. My doorbell would ring, though, so I had to show the li’l rascal and his family an empty candy bin.

I just walked out onto the porch. The neighbors yelled over, “Busy year! We’re down to our last bag! Did you run out of candy?”

“Like, an hour ago.”

We all enjoyed a good laugh, but I think the HOA is considering an emergency meeting to kick me out of the neighborhood.

In conclusion, in the event I become a father some day, I am now desensitized to kids looking disappointed. Point for Scaia!