So the first time you hear the concept of Halloween when you're a kid your brain can't even process the information. You're like: "What is this? What did you say?" "What did you say about giving out candy? Who's giving out candy?" "Everyone that we know is just giving out candy!"
Nick made me give away my Hello Kitty TV, my Hello Kitty microwave and my Hello Kitty toaster. I got to keep the Hello Kitty cordless phone.
He wove those three threads into a talk ranging from annually spending a week at Halloween as a child collecting candy to giving candy to hundreds of children at Halloween as an adult; from childhood assistance he received from adults, particularly after his parents divorced, to saying I challenge you to be a caring adult in someone's life ... Great times call forth great leaders.
Sometimes we're so concerned about giving our children what we never had growing up, we neglect to give them what we did have growing up.
The great thing about candy is that it can't be spoiled by the adult world. Candy is innocent. And all Halloween candy pales next to candy corn, if only because candy corn used to appear, like the Great Pumpkin, solely on Halloween.
When I was growing up, we had a widow living next door to us. So the habit was that if we went to the grocery store, we called her first. If we cut our yard, we cut her yard, no questions asked.
Growing up, I ate a lot of candy. If you were my dentist, you would know that, you know, but I eat a lot of candy, so from eight to probably, like, 15, you wouldn't see me without a pack of Skittles.
What kind of woman greets the Beast Lord with 'here, kitty, kitty'?
Hello Kitty is an icon that doesn't stand for anything at all. Hello Kitty never has been, and never will be, anything. She's pure license; you can even get a Hello Kitty car! The branding thing is completely out of control, but it started as nothing and maintains its nothingness. It's not about the ego, and in that way it's very Japanese.
Making movies is eating candy. It's a very expensive candy, so you value when you can do it. So when you can do it twice at once, it's like, you know, a kid in a candy store!
Children will watch anything, and when a broadcaster uses crime and violence and other shoddy devices to monopolize a child's attention, it's worse than taking candy from a baby. It is taking precious time from the process of growing up.
You know, people always warn children about taking candy from strange adults. But they never warn us adults about taking candy from strange children.
You know, people always warn children about taking candy from strange adults. But they never warn us adults about taking candy from strange children. All those sweet-looking kids who sell boxes of candy bars on the street to help pay for schooling - how do we know what's in those bars? And don't even get me stated on that nefarious institution designed to lure unsuspecting customers into buying mysterious frosted goodies: the bake sale. Adults, be warned: if a child wanted to poison you it would be a piece of cake! Literally a piece of cake.
The holy land was supposed to be spotless, a serious equivalent of Disneyland in which not a single candy wrapper is to stay on the ground for more than a few minutes.
The worst thing about Halloween is, of course, candy corn. It's unbelievable to me. Candy corn is the only candy in the history of America that's never been advertised. And there's a reason. All of the candy corn that was ever made was made in 1911. And so, since nobody eats that stuff, every year there's a ton of it left over.
I got into an argument with my original publisher. They wanted me to do 'Kitty' and nothing else. I wanted to do lots of things, not just 'Kitty' books.