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Well, the 2025 Spooktacular is in the books.  My neighbor called it “the last bachelor Spooktacular,” as it’s the last front porch recital before my wedding.  It is also distinct in that it is very likely the last front porch recital at my current home, as Dr. Fiancée and I are in the process of purchasing a home.  Of course, if my house lingers on the market for an extended period—a distinct possibility in my rural community—we could see a Spring Jam in Lamar in May 2026.  We shall see!

But I digress.  The “last bachelor Spooktacular” was truly a bachelor’s endeavor.  None of my family could attend, and Dr. Fiancée was both sick and up the entire night before on-call.  That meant yours portly had to take care of the preparations solo.

Fortunately, I’d gotten a head-start by working around the house each night after work.  By the time last Saturday rolled around, however, I was absolutely wiped out, and slept in until after 11 AM—a rarity for me.  Dr. Fiancée suspects that I was sick (I repeated the sleeping-in feat the following day), and I had been fighting off a cold most of the week, but even with my delayed start, I managed to get everything done.  I even made my Mom’s legendary Rotel dip, which consists of melting vast quantities of Velveeta “cheese” product and mixing it with two cans of Rotel diced tomatoes and green chilis.  I apparently did it right, because it was a hit.

Regardless, there was still a good bit to do in the yard and on the front porch.  I’m not exactly big on regular cleaning—another quality of my rapidly expiring bachelorhood—and my front porch was looking pretty forlorn.  The yard itself was a bit rough, but my neighbor had mowed it earlier in the week, so I mainly just had to deal with the flower beds and some pruning.

It was a day of little things going awry.  For example, I grill hot dogs for the festivities.  My grill had plenty of propane, but the electric starter wouldn’t work.  When I went to get a stem lighter to light the grill manually, the lighter was out of butane.  I couldn’t locate any matches, so I surrendered and decided to boil the hot dogs (on the plus side, my grill got a good cleaning).  When I made the Rotel dip, I had the heat too high and some of the cheesy goo bubbled over onto my stove.  John’s PA had a faulty cable—and so on.

But, in spite of it all—and I was more stressed than this post is letting on—the event was a success.

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Today’s post is a SubscribeStar Saturday exclusive.  To read the full post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.  For a full rundown of everything your subscription gets, click here.

Tonight’s the night—the 2025 Spooktacular!  My students have been working hard on their solos, and it should be a fun night.

I have done a concert around Halloween for years, and started calling it the “TJC Spooktacular” in 2019.  At that point, it was pretty much a solo show, with my buddy John hopping on to accompany me on a few tunes (or for me to accompany him).

During The Age of The Virus, I couldn’t find a venue that would book live music, largely due to concerns about big groups of people in a confined space.  So I conceived of turning my front lawn into a seating area and my porch into a stage.  Thus, the Spooktacular in its modern iteration was born.

That first front porch Spooktacular in 2020 was not a recital for my private music students, but was instead a more self-indulgent concert:  John and I missed playing live music.  I also paid a couple of groups to perform as openers:  one of my students and his punk band—their first live gig—and two of my open mic music friends.

Then I began to transition towards the Spooktacular being a recital for my students.  That helped to attract more people to the event, but also shifted the tone away from “raucous-but-mild-Halloween party” to “family-friendly Halloween party.”  The original Spooktacular was never bacchanalian, but the current recital version is much more focused on family fun.  The costume contest also seems to be a big hit among the little ones, too.

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