ELM STREET

[Doodle Diaries is a series of true stories brought to life by illustration. As always, these are real life anecdotes from my past. Names may or may not have been changed to protect the lives and dignity of the characters. Enjoy!]In celebration of Halloween, today's Doodle Diary goes all the way back to circa 1985. My family was living in Washington at the time. Our neighbors had 2 boys, ages 4 and let's say 6. I remember the youngest was 4 specifically because he couldn't pronounce the word "four". Whenever someone asked him how old he was, he replied "fong". My siblings and I even tried to help him.Us: "Say 'FFFFFF'".Him: "FFFFF".Us: "Okay, now say 'or'".Him: "ong".To be honest, they were pretty shitty kids. We never invited them over, they just kinda always showed up. The older one always had a runny nose and the younger one always had his butt crack showing. Maybe it was the other way around, or maybe both always had runny noses and butt cracks showing. Either way, to save anyone from any possible embarrassment, I'll change their names. Let's call the older one Dip, and the younger one Shit.  The first A Nightmare on Elm Street movie had come out within the year and Freddy Krueger was by far the scariest thing I could ever imagine. I did not have horrible parents so I had not seen the movie. I'm pretty sure Dip and Shit saw it. Anyway, my older brother, sister and I thought it would be fun to play a prank on our horrible neighbor kids that would involve our Dad's old gardening glove and a set of steak knives.  The plan was to use myself and my sister as bait. We would invite Dip and Shit over to play (the only time we ever actually invited them over). We would tell them we wanted to show them something cool in the garage. Once we had them in the garage, we would lock the door behind them.  My sister wasn't really wearing a ski mask, I just thought it would be funny if she was. I, on the other hand, was definitely wearing a "Where's the Beef?" tshirt.As we locked the garage door and turned off the lights, my brother, who was hiding under the car, started making scratching sounds on the concrete ground with the homemade Freddy Krueger glove. We may or may not have started flickering the lights on and off in a seizure-inducing manner as my brother jumped out from under the car to reveal the Freddy Krueger glove...  I actually don't remember how this story ended, but I'm pretty sure there were some pants peed and homes ran to. Thinking back on it now... steak knife glove, dark garage, kids running around... this could have ended much worse.  Happy Halloween! Be safe. There's a bunch of weirdos out there!- Dru