Guilty Pleasures

So there are something only available at this time of year (or have such limited distribution they might as well only be available now).

One of my friends quests for the General Mills monster cereals. He tells me that this year he started his Halloween with Booberry.

Me, I quest for Kraft caramels. Year round you can find Brach's, but there' something different to their formula., It's okay, but has more of a cooked flavor to it. Maybe it's more caramelized. But I like Kraft. Thursday night, I found some at Safeway. On sale.

I got four bags.

Last night, I shared one with Jennifer, which she appreciated because she knows I don't share my candy well. Probably comes from being an only child. you don't know selfishness until you try to get me to share my Starbursts. But I gave her a cube of caramel.

After the moans of pleasure, she said she understood why I liked them better.

Then she told me to take them to the office because she didn't want them in the house.

Halloween and a Video

All right, first off this video blows me away. Beyond the coolness of the whole thing, they do it without yard lines and hash marks to guide off of.



Second, as promised... My costume:

Preparations

Last night Jennifer and I went to the Spirit store for Halloween gear. It was in the old Marhsall's building in Pleasant Hill, and was surprisingly roomy; much better than last year time in the old Good Guys in Concord.

We got lots of little things including green makeup, black detail makeup, and black hairspray for me. And if you can get my costume from that, I'll be surprised.

I'll be sure to get pictures of it up tomorrow.

Holy Pix

All right, I'm using Flickr, to keep my sets separate for parental consumption.

Here are the pictures I took.

Here are the pictures Aileen took.

And here are the pictures John took.

Not that they are all that different, but they are different enough.

P-A-R-T-Y!

Oh, the costumes we had. I was St. Peter in a way that I really thought more people would get. Jennifer was the Holy Ghost inspired by Eddie Izzard.

As for saints, we had St. Pauli (Girl), St. Stephen (stoned to death), Should-be-a-Saint Mother Teresa, and St. Deborah (from Judges).

Other puns we had were the Holly Ghost... Space Ghost... The "Say Ain't" Couple...

Rounding out the roll call we had two angels, a blinged out monk, a Monty Python style Spanish Inquisitor, a death (darth?) monk, Titania, and Hera/Aphrodite.

And the Dread Pirate Roberts. Not me, just Jack.

And Mike and Nick without costumes.

And I forgot my jump drive with pictures at home, so I'll post those tonight.

This is just between you and me, smashed hat...

Oh my, what a weekend.

We can continue with Friday where I dressed as Westley, the Dread Pirate Roberts. I got a wide range of comments from "Zorro!" to "You look like that guy; you know, from that movie." Essentially, no one really got the costume except for the few real geeks in the office. So I didn't win the contest, but I looked damn good.

After work, I had a haircut, and then went home and changed, and went to the gym. I got home about 7:00, and just sat down and watched "Smallville." I kept the porch light off, and only got one ring at the doorbell. I'm sure because they saw lights inside, but "No Porch Light = No Candy". I learned that at an young age. And yes, I am torn by my feelings for "Smallville" and this comic sums it up best.

Saturday morning was for shopping for the party. I was at Costco when they opened at 9:30 to get alcohol and a few other things (like roses for Jennifer). Then I went home and unpacked those bits, and waited for noon to come around. At noon I headed over to Safeway where I had ordered food trays of cold cuts, chicken, and sushi. And after getting everything into the fridges and finally prepared, I had almost five hours to kill.

It was a very relaxing time before the party. I wish it could have been like that for all of my parents' parties growign up. There was always so much stress the entire day (and a few previous) before hand. It kind of helped to have done all of the decorating Thursday night.

And then it was party time...

Flashbacks

Last year I dressed as the Joker.

And this morning as I'm driving to work with my big black mask, I remembered driving to work on Halloween back in 1997.

I was doing temp work at the Bank One offices in Lexington, KY. I had picked up a coworker and fellow grad student, and we were on our way. Like last year, I was dressed as the Joker.

And halfway to work, I was rear-ended. I saw it coming, and was about to warn Reuben, when we got hit. The force of the impact pushed me into the car ahead of me. Twice.

The idiot in the car who hit me was some kid, and the car I hit had two large black men in it. And I was dressed as the Joker.

Soon the police arrived, and had us pull into a nearby parking lot. They took our statements, and told me that my car, a 1988 Toyota Corolla SR5, was pretty solid having not taken any real damage. And I was dressed as the Joker.

Then I got to work, and explained why I was late. I ended up winning the costume contest, and had the notoriety of having been spotted on the road by high up execs visiting from the Ohio headquarters.

Truly my most memorable Halloween.