Happy Halloween

Well the day of the devil is upon us. And I shall give you my Top Ten Favorite All Hallow's Eve moments:

10. When my Granddad baked for me a pumpkin birthday cake. He was a baker, and the thing looked exactly like a pumpkin. I think I cried when they cut it.

9. When at age 16 I took two girls I babysat for Trick or Treating, and I dressed up as a flenser (who loved Judy Blume?). Which was perfect because it was pouring out and it the costume involved a rain jacket. I am not telling what flenser is, look it up.

8. The fact that my brother dressed up as Dracula for about 7 years straight. Conversations usually went like this: "Hey, Michael Jaymie, what do you want to be for Halloween this year? Dracula? Really? Wow."

7. The fact that after a while my brother and I got smart in the ways of Halloween and used not the Halloween themed plastic small bags (which would always rip from the weight), but king sized pillow cases, and as for those pumpkin carriers - pure amateur hour.

6. The Great Candy Trade. Nothing beats free candy, but trading with your inept sugar frenzied cousin 3 Smarties and a Rollo for a full size snickers bar might even be better.

5. The fact that I never went berserk on Halloween - egging, shaving creaming, or toilet papering anything because I believed in the sanctity of the tradition. And before you ask, I was a loner in high school.

4. My pillowcase clown outfit that my mom made. It was fantastic. She sew pillow cases together, painted my face, put my hair in pig tails, and gave me a red bulbous nose. It was a phenomenal costume, and handmade.

3. Trick or treating in the projects. I grew up in Charlestown in the projects, which meant that each building had about 20 doors to knock on, and the candy was incredible and this one guy gave dollar bills out. I remember at the time thinking he was the best person I ever met in my entire life. Makes me almost want to give out money - but I just spent $17,000 on a new sewer pipe, so I don't think so.

2. My garbage can outfit. Which remains the best costume I ever came up with - basically I bought a plastic trash can, cut out the bottom, put shoulder straps on it and then wore the cover as a hat. I completed the look with these nasty brown and black tights and a garbage bag for my candy. Aside from people throwing my candy into the actual barrel I was wearing, it was the best. So basically, I loved being trash and I think my life all makes sense now.

1. Owen's First Halloween, which is today. He's a skeleton and so cute - photo above. I love that I get to do this all over again. Yeah!

Happy Halloween everyone.