As usual, I screwed up. The '94 fall festival production went off so smoothly that the city decided they could run it. Little did I know? Anyway, I proceeded under the assumption (we all know what the word assume means) that they produce an event at least equal to my own.
On this I based my plans. I built a brand new haunt for little kids, expanded the castle and purchased $8k in props. Part of the castle improvement was a new grand entry and pier and beam floor. Castle Dragon was closer to its finished form. The fire department that cause me so much grief the year before barely looked at the castle and did not bother to test the fire alarm or sprinkler systems. The building department, however, produced a parade through the castle. Unknown to me something else was happening. Powers at be within the city had decided that haunts were bad. These are the same people that produced an annual event for ten years. The staff necessary to produce the fall festival was never assigned. The event was not produced. The driving force behind my demise was the Soccer Association. It seems that they decided that they did not want to share the use of the facility with a haunt. This park was huge. The entire soccer facility was in the rear of the park. Had its own parking and could not be seen from the front of the park, where I was. One week before October I was informed that the city was canceling the event. Even with this four vendors and the carnival showed up. The city did all in its power to make my life miserable. No Parking signs were erected everywhere. Orange temporary fencing surrounded the haunt and the parking lot. And they locked the park gates at 10pm. They went through a stack of locks. It seems that they kept disappearing. But not even that helped. The season was a disaster. The haunt for kids had one paying customer. The castle itself made less than it made the year before. But on the bright side I had many cool props, ahhhh! The Pumpkin Patch Kidz (kids haunt) was great. The building had a 24' wide by 24' tall pumpkin for its front. Once inside you watched a special effects video, had monster make up demo and met the Pumpkin Patch Kidz. They were kids with pumpkins for heads in Halloween costumes. Admission included a photo with your choice of Kidz. We had only one paying customer, but we had many birthday parties. Over all it was a success. Considering that the event was canceled. The carnival operator was not a happy camper. No one had told him anything. He arrived, set up and opened before he realized that something was wrong. He pulled out early and sent his big rides to other events. No season goes by with out some fun little thing happening. Because of the haunts exposed position to the public, I spent the nights inside its haunted confines. I notified the police that I was doing this, but… Sunday night someone knocking on the front door of the castle awakened me. I looked up and saw flashing red lights everywhere. The castle appeared to be surrounded. I got up, dressed and opened the front door. OK, I never said I was bright, basically kinda dim, for the most part. Anyway, spotlights converged on my location as well as long pointy things. I was told to get on my knees, put my hands on my head and lace my fingers. I hesitated and began to speak, but I'm not that dumb, and did as I was told. In the distance I heard a voice shout, "He's the wrong color". It seems that they were chasing someone and they thought he was hiding in or under the castle. They apologized and I wobbled back into the castle, where I tried to sleep. Of all the things that went wrong in '95 I could not imagine things getting worse, gee, all I had to do was wait till '96.Mad Hatter
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