Since it's only two weeks from Halloween, I made my usual foray into Christian Right Country to find out what their plans are for this Halloween. I don't know where to be sad or just bored that there is nothing original to report. The same folks are still claiming that if you let your child dress up as Spiderman or a Disney princess and collect candy from the neighbors, that child will wind up killing cats and murdering babies as offerings to his or her Dark Master Darth Vader--er,  Lucifer. Or at the very least they'll end up sneaking copies of Harry Potter books which will lead them into corruption and Satanism, with usual cat killing and baby murdering  along the way. You do get the usually advice that you should give out Jack tracts warning of the dangers of Halloween (dead cats and babies,  and eternal damnation, natch) to the poor misguided innocents who expect candy, not a cheesy cartoon pamphlet designed to lure them into Dominionism .  Funny how these people are always screaming "parental rights" when it comes to their kid being exposed to the theory of evolution or accurate info on birth control and STI prevention--but have no qualms about foisting their values on the children of people who don't buy into their rather unpleasant version of Christianity.

Yawn.

I thought I had nothing to write about this year, and then I remembered something that gave me chills.  Back in 91-94, we were living in Brunswick, ME, and we often visited friends near Boston. One afternoon, we decided to head over to Salem. There are number of great museums  there, from the House of the Seven Gables, where Nathaniel Hawthorne's ancestor and one of the judges of th