VICTORIA – After an exhaustive overview of decades of data including eyewitness accounts, the majority of monster experts have reached the conclusion that climate change has led to a significant shift in the beginning of the mash season for North America’s monsters.
Jasmine Colter, head of the Monsterology Department at the University of Victoria, explains: “I was working in the lab late one night, when my eyes beheld an eerie sight. For my monster from his slab began to rise, and suddenly, to my surprise, he did the mash. IN THE MIDDLE OF OCTOBER!”
Monsterologists began keeping detailed records of monster mashing in the 1960s, and for decades the monster mash occurred every October 31st. That changed in 2002, when, to the shock of the unprepared scientific community, the mash took place on October 30th. It’s been steadily moving backwards at a rate of a little less than a day each year since. This year’s mash was on October 16th.
“It’s not just the date of the mash that’s changing, the behaviours we see during the mash also seem to be shifting as the planet warms,” Colter said. “For example, there’s more noticeable decay in the zombies due to a warmer, wetter climate, which naturally leads to them having less fun.”
“Also, several of the ghouls lost their humble abodes in recent years due to graveyard flooding, and the vampire population has exploded because they’re able to go out in the daytime in regions where the sun disappears for weeks on end due to the smoke from forest fires.”
“The Wolfman and Dracula are wealthy individuals who are heavily invested in the fossil fuel industry, so they’ve blocked our efforts to conduct more intensive research as to the effects of the climate crisis on monster rituals,” Colter said. “We get most of our information from drone surveillance, post-mash reconstruction techniques, and the first-hand accounts of a very helpful mash participant we can’t name for his own safety. We’ll call him Smigor.”
Colter warns that if the Earth continues to warm at its current rate due to unchecked emissions from human activity, by the end of this century the monster mash could consist of thousands of starving vampires holding midday raves under a smokey black sky in the middle of June.
