News: Halloween 2011

It's Halloween! Link round-up below.

• Let's start with pumpkin carving. Both The Guardian and NPR offer expert advice on getting the best from your gourd. Looking for a change from the same-old same-old? Martha Stewart offers an alternative.
• Both the Los Angeles Times and CNN break down Halloween 2011 by the numbers.
• The New York Times describes this year's Halloween celebrations at the White House.
• Our friends at the 2nd Air Division Memorial Library have got their own fun and games going on.
• The Daily Beast profiles a growing trend for "highbrow" horror fiction.
• Looking for costume ideas? Do you happen to have two iPads to hand? Then Gizmodo will help you out.
• Of course, not everything at Halloween is all in good fun: as Clutch reports, students at Ohio University have launched a poster campaign highlighting the problem of racism in Halloween costumes. 
• And finally: Google's Halloween doodle is a thing to behold:

A couple of picks from our editorial committee:

Nick Cleaver:
I’m not a big fan of Halloween and I don’t do horror movies which rather narrows things down for me. As usual, however, The Simpsons comes up trumps. Every year the Treehouse of Horror episodes come up with ingenious twists on horror staples. Highlights over the years include ToH5’s ‘The Shinning’, the computer animated Homer3 of ToH6, and the Orson Welles tribute ‘The Day the Earth Looked Stupid’ in ToH17. If I had to pick one episode though it would be Treehouse of Horror 7 – three great segments culminating in the wonderful ‘Citizen Kang’ in which recurring alien characters Kang and Kodos abduct Bill Clinton and Bob Dole before the 1996 election and take their places on the campaign trail. “As a young boy, I dreamed of being a baseball....”



Bev Cadby:
With Halloween fast approaching my motto is run for the nearest supermarket. However, if you are in training to become a domestic goddess here is a link that will help you make spooky spiders and pumpkin pies - good luck.

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And finally, finally: make sure to come to our Halloween screening today at 1.20pm in Arts 2.01.