Up My Own Ass

Halloween stinks! Just as much as the metal band Helloween, who, even in my teen metalhead days, I couldn’t take seriously.

There are three things I can’t stand: green peas, Norwegians, and anyone who refers to Halloween as a “holiday.” It ain’t a holiday. Any more than Valentine’s Day or your stupid birthday, no matter how hard they clap at Friday’s.

The good news is that I see less and less children “trick or treating,” or “begging for candy from strangers” these days. You have to figure that between the yearly media scare tactics regarding pedophiles and poisoned candy and the still-frequent use of the racist term “spooks,” Halloween could very well die off in a year or two. Once the secularists’ war on Christmas is over, All Hallows Eve is next.

Every Halloween I either spend four hours lying flat on my stomach in the living room with the lights out or I sit myself on the front porch with a shotgun and a bowl or razor blades. And I don’t dress up because I’m an adult.

And I do not costume well.

I’ve dressed up exactly once since I was 12. I’ve blocked most of that last one out. I was a sad little adult ninja, chubby and uncoordinated, wearing glasses. There was a 10-year-old also dressed as a ninja who looked much cooler than I did. Oh, I so should have taken him out – Storm Shadow style.

At 12 I went out dressed as my hero, “Rowdy” Roddy Piper. This was in New England. So underneath the “Hot Rod” shirt my mom lovingly made for me I wore a gray sweatshirt, and under the blanket that was acting as a kilt I wore blue sweatpants so I was warm and toasty. And a loser. It was the saddest thing you’d have ever seen. Charlie Brown looked cooler.

The years prior to the Piper fiasco, maybe two or three of them in a row, I was someone from the band Kiss every year. My mother was quite adept at the face paint, even if the rest of the costume was more drag queen that Gene, Paul, Ace or Peter. I should have dressed as Hitler, like Eric Cartman or a kid in a Ryan Boudinot short story.

I’d like to continue with my tale, but the tears on the keyboard are making it very hard to type. So happy stupid Halloween, you bastards.