From the Dead Letter Office:
Our friend Gzzlglug writes…

Hey, Glugmuck

If you don’t count swearing, “I stupidly believed” ranks as one of the top 10 most-uttered canards by the haunt engineer. A few other gems in that list are: “We assumed”, “Randy said”, and “It’ll be fine”.

To date, I can’t recall a single project that ended the way I thought it would when it was hatched. Sometimes that works out for the best, and sometimes you get a Packing Tape Zombie.

Enjoy your successes and toss your failures over the fence. They make good nesting material for bunnies and quail. Packing tape zombies, however, degrade differently. They’ll hang around, usually out of spite, to remind you of your spectacular potential for inadequacy.

On the plus side, when it finally fills up with ants, it will eventually burst.

Gruesomely.

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Success and Failure…

Category: From The Undead Letter Office, Halloween   Tags: failure, packing tape zombie, success

From the dead letter office…

Our friend Steve writes:

Subject: Bruno comment
Hi there, I was wondering, could you use ivy vines instead of grape vines?

Yo, Steve!

Not being well-versed in the botanical arts myself, I can’t answer your question. But I will anyway.

Grape vines are woody and thick enough that they are the main support structure for Bruno. If ivy vines have similar properties, then yes, they should work fine. If you just want to use ivy vines because they look cool, then go raid the scrap wood pile and build a frame on which to hang everything.

Kids and little lambs eat ivy, so your scarecrow should be well-fed.

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Meet Bruno, grape vine monster, and Grumble’s dad

Category: From The Undead Letter Office, Halloween   Tags: bruno, grape vines, ivy, scarecrow

From the dead letter office…
After all the letters over the years, I finally get a reply. And not a word about that Hot Wheels track I wanted.

This just in from “santa” …

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Whoa! Santa?

You thinking about getting back at jack for what he did to you? Yikes! I’m pretty sure I don’t want to get into the middle of that war, but I suppose I can at least try to answer your question.

Troubleshooting circuits is easy and fun for the nerdy types who might have a degree in electronics (cough), but it stops being fun if the thing you’re working on basically runs on magic. In other words, if you don’t really grasp how the work of the circuit gets done by its components, then you’re screwed from the start. Luckily, this is a very simple circuit.

Do all the obvious (cough cough) things first.

• Does the light bulb work?
• Is the lamp turned on? (COUGH COUGH COUGH!)
• Plugs are in all the way?

Turn the CD player on and turn the volume all the way up. Plug in AC power and plug in your lamp. Slowly turn the adjustment potentiometer until it’s all the way to the right. Anything? No? Slowly turn it the other direction until it stops. Still nothing? Hmm.

Okay, go get another CD. Try AC DC or Iron Maiden (a personal favorite). Something loud and obnoxious (Sineaid O’connor is too obnoxious, but your thinking’s on the right track.) Repeat the potentiometer adjustment. If the lamp reacts this time, then your audio input is coming from a single channel, but the thunder soundtrack is playing on the other one (for some reason). Swap the channels.

How do I tell for certain that this is a channel issue? Pop the thunder soundtrack back in and listen. Is it only coming out of one speaker? That’s the channel you want to connect to the color organ.

Still nothing? Sigh. Okay…

1. Disconnect AC power so you don’t die.
2. Disconnect the lamp so you don’t die because it’s somehow conducting current.
3. Disconnect the CD player. I don’t think it’ll kill you, but do it anyway.
4. Inspect all solder joints. Is there any slop that is causing a short? Fix it. Are all your solder joints nice and shiny? If not, a cold solder joint may be blocking current flow. De-solder any dull joints and re-solder them correctly.
5. Are all the components installed correctly? (i.e. not upside down) Are any of them loose?
6. After fixing the slop and bad joints, run through the above test again.

Still nothing? Then you might have blown your SCR. This will happen if you try to drive a lamp that’s too large. I don’t remember what the rating of the SCR is for this circuit, but I wouldn’t try to push more than 60W with it. Anything more, and it’ll fry. Yeah, I know; it’s not a lot of voltage. I’ve been meaning to put together a beefier lightning machine for a while now and I haven’t gotten around to it yet. I’ll get there.

So, you’ve gotten this far and the thing still doesn’t work. Bummer, dude. Hire a neighbor kid to stand in the bushes with a flashlight.

Category: From The Undead Letter Office, Halloween   Tags: color organ, electronics, lightning machine, soldering

 

From the dead letter office…
I don’t know why I didn’t think of this sooner.

Subject: Carpet Adhesive

I think I purchased the wrong product. It said latex on the container, and easy cleanup. After applying the adhesive to my pumpkin it never dried. It is still tacky to the touch. I did put some talcum on it, and it really helped but my ridges on the pumpkin are still soft. What do you recommend I do to correct this problem, or is this normal?

Thank you,
Katrin, your newest Fan!

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Hi, Katrin!

Always good to have a new minion. Make sure to drop by HR to get fitted for your Dreadnought uni-tard. We’re switching to a new darker gray with rust red piping this fall. Capes are for formal occasions only, and you’ll have to buy your own. We recommend a tailor shop down on Broadway, and if you use him, we reimburse the cost. It’s just more efficient that way.

Ah, the tacky, yuck, sticky flooring adhesive question again. (I get this a lot) I must update the website with more information so folks won’t unnecessarily freak out over this stuff.

Okay, the good news is that your pumpkin is probably dry. Or, maybe that’s the bad news. You see, this flooring adhesive stuff dries tacky. Very tacky. I think the phrase “Anna Nicole Smith tacky” was used on the site before it was just a mean thing to say and not extraordinarily cruel. It’s going to feel like the inside of a zombie’s chest cavity for a long time.

Talcum powder (or plain old dirt) will take away the tackiness. You have to rub it in for this to work. Just sprinkling it on and dusting it off won’t cut it; and use a lot. Pretend you’re a 17 year old zombie getting ready for the big dance. A sprinkle a day helps keep maggots away, and that cute redhead on the debate team hates maggots. You’re used to them, and it’s no big deal if one or two drop off now and then. They wriggle off on their own errands. But sheesh! A couple of the little guys get curious at the lunch table and it’s pandemonium!

Try the talc regimen again, and rub it in good. An old paint brush can help to get it into all the little crooks and nannies.

~ Headspook

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Answers to a few other faqs on the subject:

– “Carpet latex” is just a generic term for “flooring adhesive”. It’s about the consistency of peanut butter, and you can get it just about anywhere (Wal-mart, Home Depot, Lowes). Try looking for Roberts 3300 Carpet Adhesive. Or buy it here!

– You either like carpet glop or you hate it.  It worked fine for me, but after migrating to white PVA glue (Elmer’s), I don’t miss it.

– Poly vinyl acetate. White Elmer’s glue. Get it by the gallon at HD.
Or buy it here!

Category: From The Undead Letter Office, Halloween   Tags: carpet glue, carpet latex, dead letter office, faq, roberts 3300 carpet adhesive