Jello, Why I Never Touch the Stuff (Republish...

-One of my, well, not fondest but most vivid childhood memories involving jello took place one October when I was about ten. My friends and I challenged each other to make the most horrifying "spook house" in our respective basements. The yearly challenge arose, I suppose as the days were shorter, and no one was allowed out after dark, without parental supervision. This meant long evenings at home alone. TV could only entertain on certain nights, and what ten year old girl was interested in "Gunsmoke" and "The Fugitive". In other words, the parents, usually Daddy, ruled the TV dial, and none of his interests mirrored mine, except perhaps Ed Sullivan. That man sure got a kick out of Topo Gigio.

As I hung Mom's pristine white sheets throughout the basement, filled Dad's old flannel shirts and jeans with other old clothes to create monsters, I realized my poor little spook house was lacking. Yeah, the wet string hung over the banister was creepy to the touch, and the Monster masks on my Dad's clothes were at first shadowy glance, scary, something was still missing.

I needed blood. Goopy, clotted, nasty, stinky blood. I thought about ketchup, and while I love the stuff, i remembered becoming nauseous the previous year when a pal had used it in massive amounts while playing house. I, for the life of me can't remember why she needed all that ketchup.

I searched the kitchen for a good blood substitute. Chocolate syrup? Nah, can't waste good Hershey's. That piece of advice holds true today. Then I had a brainstorm Jello! Red, squiggly, wiggly jello, doctored up to resemble brains, blood and every kind of gore my ten year old mind could muster. Frankly, I couldn't muster much, as my experience with gore was limited to "Chiller Theatre" on Fridays nights ,watching the
old standards of horror,Frankenstein, The Mummy, and all those old Vincent Price creepers.

I proceeded to make several containers of red Jello. I knew enough to add ingredients after it had set up a bit. I added ketchup( gets rid of the "sheen") and chopped veggies, to mimic vomit. believe me when that stuff came out of the fridge, I didn't need it much. The odor was enough to induce what it was representing. tomato paste was added to another ,not refrigerated batch to mimic blood (thickens it up), and still another was mixed with mayonnaise and placed in Mom's round, fancy mold, for brains.

The evening of Trick or Treat, we all met at Cheryl's house. My house was second, as we left. Cheryl's basement was a bit scary, as she had older brothers at home to scare the bejesus out of us girls. We got to my house and went to the basement, where I had all my surprises waiting. A couple of girls screamed as they headed downstairs, the first to have their faces plastered with wet string. Entering the "spook house" they were met by the most horrid smell. My fake vomit/jello was truly foul smelling. Tip: never put onions in jello and leave it out for long. The brains came out perfectly, they even held their shape, well, close enough anyway, when I unmolded them to the front of my stuffed"Daddy", along with a good dose of the jello blood. The white sheets had been smeared with the bloody stuff also.

The loudest scream of all, however, came from my Mom when she came down and surveyed the scene. "I'll never get that stench out of this room", "Young lady, you are sooooo done for the night"
I never did see my other friends' spook houses that night, but I won the competition hands down. My prize? Candy, as I had to donate all mine to the garbage after my "little stunt".

I slept on pink stained sheets for a long time after that, and spook houses were strictly forbidden. My most cherished lesson from that night had to be, jello stains stuff, forever.