The Skeleton
Started: 2021-10-09 20:53:33
Submitted: 2021-10-09 21:13:22
Visibility: World-readable
A plastic skeleton dressed up as a librarian
For Halloween, Kiesa set up a nearly-life-sized plastic skeleton on our porch.
In the middle of September, we went to pick apples in Watsonville, and on the way back home we stopped by Target so Kiesa could pick up a skeleton.
Calvin carried it into the house, and we confirmed it's about the same height he is.
I spent some time on the Internet trying to figure out what the skeleton's pelvis told me about the skeleton's biological sex, and concluded that artistic liberties had been taken with the pelvis, so it was impossible to tell.
Kiesa gave the skeleton a wig and glasses, and dressed it in a skirt and cardigan, and decided it would be a librarian. She wanted the skeleton to be able to hold a book in its hands, but the skeleton's forearms were fixed into position so the bones wouldn't rotate so that the hands would open upwards. We could cheat and turn the hand assembly up-side-down at the wrist, but there wasn't an easy way to remove the hand and flip it around.
Having the skeleton in the entry made it easy to cross-reference the anatomical model to identify the bone (the fifth metatarsal) that Kiesa broke in her left foot, forcing her to wear a boot for six weeks at the end of the summer.
Kiesa set up the skeleton to sit on a bench in our entryway, at the base of the stairs. For the first couple of days every time I came down the stairs I'd forget it was there and then I'd notice a vaguely humanoid figure out of the corner of my eye where I wasn't expecting anyone to be, then I'd look and remember the skeleton.
Finally Kiesa moved the skeleton to a chair on the front porch, where it's no longer in my field of vision every time I come down the stairs. It might still startle visitors to our front porch, though most of our visitors end up at the back of our house anyway (because of the confusing way our house number is attributed to the street).
We still have three weeks left before Halloween so we may end up with more decorations before the end of the season.
