Lovely Little Shelf

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, by Roald Dahl

After reading and being absolutely obsessed with Matilda in elementary school, I made quick work of Roald Dahl’s other books.  I am fairly certain that I read all of them and can’t think of one that disappointed.  His kind of dark humor and belief that kids are smarter than we give them credit for won my heart then and make them stick in my head now.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was pretty much perfection in my opinion.  Snotty kids, clueless parents, a factory (if you know me, you know I have a think for factories…), tons and tons of candy,  tiny worker men?  Perfect.

This led to a total with the original movie when I was younger and unlike a lot of people, I loved the Johnny Depp one too.  The Gene Wilder one is probably in my top 10  movies, but I thought that the Johnny Depp one was probably closer to the movie and made me laugh out loud. A lot.

When I was in high school, I was at a friend’s house on the afternoon of trick-or-treat.  We were just sitting on the patio talking and saw a perfect little oompa loompa riding a bike down the street.  I freaked totally out and told Emily to go in and get a camera while I chased this kid down.  He panicked, as I’m sure I looked like a crazy person.  He rode his bike faster than I could run, so we got in the car and chased him down.  This sounds so crazy now, but at the time it was totally logical.  Anyway, when we “caught” him, we just took a few pictures with him and told him what a perfect oompa loompa he was.  The pictures turned out great, so I framed one and put it in my room, such is my love for Willy Wonka.

Probably a full year or two later, my younger brother had a friend over and they walked past my room.  His friend turned to him and said, “Dalton, why does your sister have a picture of me up in her room?”  Hilarious.  It was the little oompa loompa kid and I had successfully freaked him totally out… again.

All this to say that my love for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory actually turned me into a creeper. I love it.

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