By CLIFF DUNN, DALE MADISON & THE CHILDREN OF THE NIGHT

On Wednesday, October 31, Wilton Drive will transform into the Street of Dreams, as the Rainbow Business Coalition of Greater Fort Lauderdale (RBC), producers of June’s wildly-successful Stonewall Summer Pride, present “Wicked Wilton 2012: FAIRY TALES.”

Get out! Get out!

From 3 p.m. to 3.a.m. on October 31, Wilton Drive will be closed from N.E. 21 Court to Five Points (near Gables Wilton Park and The Naked Grape).

Village of the (Hot) Damned

The festivities for Wicked Wilton 2012: Fairy Tales will commence at 6 p.m., when the Children of the Night take to the streets. The party continues until Midnight on the street and in the area businesses, and after Midnight, the party goes on in the local bars and nightclubs, many of which have extended their closing times until 3 a.m. (check with individual bars for extended hours of operation, if any).

Have You Checked the Children?

There will be events and costume contests held up and down the drive all night long, starting at 6 p.m. with a pet costume contest at Georgie’s Alibi hosted by Florida’s own Dame Edna.

Dress to kill—or be killed! —and strut your stiff—er, stuff, down the Boulevard of Lost Souls to these cranking competitions:

8:30 p.m.             Rosie’s Bar and Grill (2449 Wilton Dr.)

8:45 p.m.             Wilton’s Bier Garden (2245 Wilton Dr.)

9:15 p.m.             New Moon (2440 Wilton Dr.)

9:45 p.m.             Georgie’s Alibi (2266 Wilton Dr.)

10:15 p.m.           Matty’s on the Drive (2426 Wilton Dr.)

10:45 p.m.           Village Pub (2283 Wilton Dr.)

11:15 p.m.           Bill’s Filling Station (2209 Wilton Dr.)

11:30 p.m.           The Manor (2345 Wilton Dr.)

Feast of the Damned

The RBC “ferrying from the other side” food vendors and conjuring a “Spirits Station” on the Drive for the convenience of revelers as they make their way from nightclub to party to bar to contest.

Something Wicked This Way Comes…

The official Wicked Wilton Website features a pre-event, Online Costume Contest, where you can enter photos of yourself decked out in your Halloween best. To enter, visit wickedwilton.com. The winner, who will qualify for a cash prize, will be announced online on or before October 31.

“This year’s event is expected to draw nearly 9,500 attendees,” says Greg Hardy, the RBC’s point man in charge of bringing Wicked Wilton together. “We have costume contests up and down the Drive, food vendors, and outdoor bars. The City is very proud, as is the Pride Center,” he adds.

The Omens

During the run-up to Wicked Wilton, establishments in-and-around the Gayborhood will offer a week full of events, a VERY BRIEF list of which includes:

Bill’s Filling Station will hold their house contest—with a theme of “Zombie Land”—at Midnight on Saturday, October 27, with cash prizes for first, second and third places.

The Alibi’s Halloween contest—“Un-Enchanted Forest”—will take place on Sunday, October 28 at 9 p.m., with cash prizes for first second and third places.

The newly-opened Village Pub will have their new overhead doors open, with a 10’ x 20’ tent, as one owner said, “just in case of rain,” with a portable bar so that no one will have to wait. The owners are keeping their theme hush-hush.

The owners at the recently-unveiled Infinity Lounge are urging friends and customers to come in and create your own “Fairy Tale.” Enjoy their Halloween version of “Alice in Wonderland” with DJ Chuck Knowles, with hours from 3 p.m. until 2 a.m. and their expanded outdoor bar. As somebody said, “A sexy good time all night long.”

“Sports and Halloween” will be featured at Sidelines Sports Bar. This year, the staff laid down the gauntlet and challenged coworkers to a Haunted House decorating contest. Teams of employees have marked off a corner of the bar to design a sinister, scary, and spine-tingling scene for all, and customers will vote on the best display of Halloween creations while enjoying specials like their “Killer Kool-Aid.”

The People Under the Stairs

At Scandals Saloon, the boys have lots of plans. This year, Scandals will celebrate All Hallows Eve on Saturday night, October 27. Patrons should come out and see their favorite bartenders in their scariest costumes in an event decorated exclusively by Halloween City (check out halloweencity.com).

Scandals’ sister bar, The Stable, will feature “Lady Fancy and her Spooktacular,” also on Saturday, October 27, with a 9 p.m. show time. On Wednesday night, October 31, it’s Candy Cornhole and her “Halloween Camp Bingo,” with a Madonna Costume Contest (the winner will receive a premium liquor basket filled with Halloween goodies), and a ticket drawing for the November 19 Madonna show.

Paranormal Activity

Many of the venues up and down the Drive will feature live entertainment (check with individual bars for acts and show times). Extra parking has been arranged at various locations around Wilton Manors for a flat fee of $10, which will allow you to park for the duration of the festivities.

Wicked Wilton 2012: Fairy Tales is co-sponsored by The Pride Center at Equality Park—which is also Wicked Wilton’s beneficiary, receiving a portion of the proceeds—and by the City of Wilton Manors. Admission is free. For more information, visit wickedwilton.com, Facebook.com/wickedwilton, and Twitter @wickedwilton.

Hey there! I’m going to hollow out a piece of fruit, carve a face into it, shove some fire inside it, and name it after you. Gather ’round, kiddies, and let me tell you a story about a boy named Jack who had this very thing happen to him.

Before we begin our story, let’s slip into our ghost jammies, grab a slice of warm pumpkin pie, a sheet and chairs to make a fort, and a flashlight. Plus a few liters of vodka. Also Tylenol. And you might as well use the bathroom while you’re up. There. Now twe’re all Halloween-cozied up.

Once upon a time, in a cozy village, there lived a boy named Jack. His brother, whose name I cannot say (because I didn’t make one up), took from Jack everything he owned: His toys, his pets, his food, his clothes, and even his chores. There was nothing Jack had that his brother didn’t want. His brother would have stolen Jack’s soul, too, had he lived through his decision on Winter to steal Jack’s pneumonia.

By the time Jack was a teenager, he was a skinny, joyless youth. People knew him simply as “Jack,” an empty boy without a personality, home, education, blah, blah, blah. He looked like crap, and smelled like it, too. And the townspeople wanted nothing to do with him. So he left.

Jack left the village, but he didn’t know what to do. His brother had stolen his passions and his dreams, so he had none to pursue. He wandered. And wandered. And wandered some more. He wandered so much, in fact, that he wandered straight to Hell.

Jack would have been shocked at the atrocities in Hell, but his brother had stolen Jack’s shock-ability, too. Upon seeing Jack’s apathy, the Devil asked him, “Why aren’t you scared? Do these tortures, these damnations, these infernos not strike fear into you?” And Jack couldn’t respond because his brother had stolen his voice, so he just shrugged.

The Devil, so used to seeing people suffer and scream, was struck by Jack’s silence. (“A breath of fresh air,” the Devil later called it while chatting with Pat Robertson.)

The Devil and Jack struck up a friendship: The Devil would complain, and Jack would listen. So good was their relationship, in fact, that the Devil fell in love with Jack.

On October 31—the anniversary of Jack’s first wandering into Hell—the Devil did something that astonished the Damned: He, who had never done a nice thing for anyone in all the history of forever gave Jack a gift, a mask to hide Jack’s always uninterested, plain face (so that he would fit in a little more and maybe make some other friends).

There was a problem, though: The Devil didn’t have anything with which to make a mask, so he sent out a demon to fetch something appropriate. It was round like a head, and orange like fire. It was in season, and it had a cute vine thing coming out of the top, like a little hat. It was, in fact, a pumpkin. The Devil emptied-out the pumpkin, carved a face into it, and put it on top of Jack’s head. Jack didn’t like the mask, but he didn’t dislike it, either (because his brother had stolen Jack’s passion). So Jack wore it. The Devil rejoiced.

And then Jack—who, despite being in Hell, was still human—died from some weird bacteria in the rotting pumpkin. During his mourning, as a tribute to his “lost” love, the Devil kept Jack’s memory alive by illuminating his mask with fire.

He’s done it every year since. Happy Halloween, lovers.

It’s time for the scariest day of the year (if you don’t count those Lindsay Lohan paparazzo shots from earlier in 2012—talk about a fright fest), and even if you plan on taking part in the October 31 Wicked Wilton or any of the other cool and creepy events going on across Greater Fort Lauderdale and SoFla, lots of your guys may be throwing a pre-party before taking to the streets this weekend or on All Hallows Eve itself.

The Monster Mash

Black lights and dark accoutrements are the easiest way to evoke Halloween. You can hit any crafts store (or Publix and CVS, for that matter) to get items that spook-up your crib, from fake cobwebs to giant plastic spiders.

Back in the days (sometime between the Civil War and the “Hunger Games”) when people used cassette tapes, I made a 1-minute “endless loop” cassette of that most familiar of Hallow-seasonal musical selections, Bach’s “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor,” which played continuously as the guests entered. Depending on the mood of your party and your guests, you can enjoy such candy faves as Bobby “Boris” Picket’s original “Monster Mash,” and the must-play “Thriller” by the late King of Pop, Michael Jackson.

Or you can go the whole “Vampire Club” route, and invite your guests to Goth-up, while you play the soundtrack from “Queen of the Damned,” and the deliciously bloodsucker-themed disc, “Bloodletting,” by Concrete Blonde (which includes the single “Bloodletting (The Vampire Song),” and don’t forget Sting’s memorable and much-praised children-of-the-night-evoking “Moon Over Bourbon Street”).

Scary Snacks

These delicious treats are fun to make and easy to prepare.

Spider Eggs

This is a visually-fun variation on deviled eggs. Slice a pitted olive in half, and place one half—rounded side up—in the center of the deviled egg. Cut the other half into eight pieces to create the legs.

Monster Fingers

These delicious and easy-to-make snacks look cool (and creepy).

Ingredients:
½ cup of salted butter, softened
¾ cup of sugar
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
¾ cup of wheat gluten
1 cup of almond flour
2 tablespoons of sliced almonds
Green or brown food coloring

Cream butter, sugar, and vanilla extract. Add several drops of food coloring, until the mixture looks gross. Add almond flour and gluten, ¼ cup at a time, kneading the mixture as necessary. Divide the dough into 16 pieces, each shaped like a finger. With a knife, carve the “knuckles” into each “finger,” bending each one slightly at the curve. Scoop out a place for the “fingernails,” and insert one almond slice into each “finger.” Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 10 minutes.

Graveyard Dirt Cake

This thing is so sinfully-good, you should go to Purgatory for 1,000 years at minimum for every bite.

Ingredients:

1 package of Oreos, or other chocolate sandwich cookies, crumbled
1 8-ounce package of cream cheese
½ cup of butter
1 cup of powdered sugar
3 cups of milk
12 ounces of whipped topping
8 ounces of vanilla pudding
2 packets of True Lemon or True Orange
1 package of gummy worms

Mix butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar, and True Lemon (or Orange) flavoring, and set aside.

Combine 2 cups of milk with vanilla pudding, and fold in the whipped topping. Add butter/cream cheese mixture, and mix well. Layer mixture with crumbled Oreos, and continue layering until all ingredients are used and the bowl is full. Decorate the top with gummy worms and plastic tombstones and other graveyard-themed cake toppers. Chill for two hours before serving.

The Walking Gingerbread Dead

Zombies are all the rage in my house, especially AMC TV’s “The Walking Dead.” Let’s “zombify” a classic, and go undead on some unsuspecting gingerbread men. After “birthing” your standard, “breathing” gingerbread men, turn them into zombies with red colored icing on their mouths, as if they are oozing blood (and other human vitals), and cut off some “limbs” and dab the “stumps” with red food dye and icing. Use little pieces of green or yellow candy to give weirded-out eyes to some of your “Walkers,” and black food gel to paint “X’s” over the eyes of other members of the “unbread.”

Ingredients:

½ cup of margarine

½ cup of sugar

½ cup of molasses

1 egg yolk

2 cups of sifted all-purpose flour

½ teaspoon of salt

½ teaspoon of baking powder

½ teaspoon of baking soda

½ teaspoon of ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon of ground cloves

1 teaspoon of ginger

½ teaspoon of ground nutmeg

In a large bowl, cream margarine and sugar together until smooth, and then stir in molasses and egg yolk. Combine flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and nutmeg, and blend into the molasses mix until smooth. Cover and chill for at least one hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. On a lightly floured surface, roll dough to ¼-inch thickness, and cut them into desired shapes using cookie cutters. On ungreased cookie sheets, place the cookies two inches apart, and bake for approximately 10 minutes, until firm. Remove from cookie sheets, and cool on wire racks, and then frost and decorate when cool. Makes about 30 “Gingerbread Undead.” Chomp!

The Gayborhood’s unofficial main “drag”—which runs from Wilton Drive north(ish) through Five Points, before becoming North Dixie Highway—has seen two recent combatants in the “Yogurt Wars,” as our gourmand, Richard David Chamberlain, has dubbed it. Like Dr. Livingstone before him, he trekked into these unchartered places—in this case, Nuts About Yogurt on Wilton Drive, and Menchie’s on North Dixie. See what just what all the fuss is about Wilton “Cultures,” in a new Dining column.

There’s anecdotal evidence that a substantial number of America’s historic, literary, and cultural giants—Alexander Hamilton, Walt Whitman, and possibly even the Great Emancipator himself, Abraham Lincoln—sported rainbow handkerchiefs in their “knickers.” Writer Robert Elias Deaton takes us to the nation’s capital—as its Capitol—for a gay old look at the Arsenal of Freedom, Washington, D.C., this week in Travel.

Leaving the tricks to you, we also add to your Halloween treats with writer Adam Strong, from our sister publication GUY Magazine, with some excellent tips on how to “Host a Fabulous(ly Scary!) Halloween Party.” Talk about scary: Fitness expert and trainer Tom Bonanti will make you sweat ’til you can’t sweat no (any) more. And Justin Jones presents an All Hallows love story—with a “germy” twist—in an all new Love Jones.

BOO! CD

LGBT History Month was launched in 2006 by Philadelphia-based Equality Forum. The remembrance features an LGBT Icon for every day in October, including a video, biography, and other educational resources, available free for download at lgbthistorymonth.com.

In 2010, the federal government recognized LGBT History Month in a ceremony led by U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan, and last year House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) issued a proclamation recognizing the tribute.

“They were experiencing some problems due to the wind which forced them to crash land here in the field,” Davie Police Capt. Dave Engle told the local television station. To avoid residences, the blimp’s pilot crashed it in a field, about five miles from its intended destination of North Perry Airport in South Broward. Federal Aviation Administration investigators inspected the scene late Sunday night before the deflated hulk was carted off.

The billboard, sponsored by the group American Atheists, attacked the Mormon Church (more accurately, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or LDS Church), citing the messages “No Blacks Allowed (until 1978)” and “No Gays Allowed (Current).” The first part refers to the LDS Church’s denial of its lay priesthood to black male members until 1978. American Atheists President David Silverman told CNN that the billboard’s second line condemns the religion’s “intolerance” and “bigotry” towards the LGBT community.

LDS Church spokesman Dale Jones told CNN, “This group seems not to know that there have been black members of the Church since our earliest history, and there are many faithful gay members of the Church today.”

That evening from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m., The Pride Center will host a Halloween Youth Dance for LGBTQ Youth and Allies, open to ages 13 to 18, with food, music, prizes, and more.

The statement, which was emailed by Dolphins President Tim Ross, decried the “Log Cabin Republicans … [purchase of] an ad in the Florida Agenda newspaper in order to drag Ambassador Stevens’ half-naked body through the pages of the newspaper for their own brazen political propaganda purposes.”

It added, “The ad sought to use the Ambassador’s death to encourage LGBT voters to back the Republican ticket in November. This is highly flawed advice in that it would be encouraging LGBT voters to support anti-equality extremists like Adam Hasner and Ellyn Bogdanoff.  These two members of our Florida Legislature, serving as Committee Chairs, have refused to even give a hearing to any legislation supporting your right to not be fired for being LGBT, your right to not be refused housing or services because you are LGBT, and your right to visit your LGBT domestic partner or spouse in the hospital.”

Last week (Florida Agenda, October 17, 2012, POLITICAL DESK: “Ad Does Not Represent Position of Log Cabin Republicans”), the organization’s national executive director, R. Clarke Cooper, similarly declaimed the Broward chapter’s decision to purchase ad space for the inflammatory political message.  In that same issue, Agenda Editor Cliff Dunn defended the decision to permit the ad to run, citing “a community journal[’s]… ethical obligation to provide a balance, offering ad space (and editorial column inches) for all political sides in a presidential election year.”

SunServe—South Florida’s oldest LGBT service agency—created the world’s first LGBT senior day care center in 2002. A recent study by the LGBT Aging Project of Massachusetts reports that 10,000 LGBT Americans reach retirement age per week, and census data suggests that there are over 3 million U.S. gay men and women over the age of 55. That number is expected to double by 2020.
Among the clients who utilize the McArtor Center’s services are solitary Baby Boomers who don’t have family or caregivers, as well as LGBT seniors whose caregivers are unable to provide around-the-clock care. The Center provides a specialized environment that is sensitive to special needs and relationships of LGBT seniors.

For more information about this and other SunServe senior services, visit sunserve.org.