How to be someone else who's awesome for Halloween.

I operate my day-to-day routine using my own Halloween-centric calendar (fuck you, Pope Gregory XIII). I'm not sure if you've noticed, but we're one week into October. According to my system, this means you're already screwed if you don't have your Halloween properly scheduled, which in turn means that we'll never be friends again. Well, that's usually what it means, but this year I'm willing to throw everyone a bone. I'm going to assemble an emergency Halloween guide for you right here on this very blog. Think of it as a crash course in being incredibly fucking awesome.

This guy's got the right idea.

1.) Picking your bad ass costume.

The first is to determine if you are, in fact, already a bad ass. I can help you answer this question; no, you are not currently a bad ass. You're reading this guide so I know you're already in serious trouble here. Your only hope is to devise such a brilliant costume that everyone will be forced to reconvene their council of Bad Assery Evaluation. The trick here is to never pull a costume directly off the rack at Target and consider your job done. Nobody is going to remember you or your stupid non-bad ass. A general rule of thumb is to avoid any recent movies. If you're going to be a character from a recent movie, then you must strive for accuracy and you are not allowed to buy a pre-assembled costume. You need to acquire all of parts on your own and never ever let the thought "eh, it's good enough" pass through your skull. You should only stop working on your costume because your girlfriend/boyfriend is bitching that you need to be at the party in 10 minutes.

But it is OK to temporarily stop to go
check out some sweet explosions.

You need to make a serious effort to set yourself above everyone else and their store-bought polyester atrocity. Elbow grease and creativity are going to be the only weapons you have. If people want to take your photo, or better yet schedule a photo shoot, then you did an incredible job. There is one simple rule to remember: no one likes you so you have to become something cool to win them over.

Under no circumstances should you dress up as a cast member of Jersey Shore. Once you open that portal to Douchebag Hell, there is no going back. And you can never wash the image of you dressed as Snooki from your significant other's mind and they absolutely will recall that image when you two are naked.

Maybe you shouldn't tell your
next girlfriend about that poor decision.

2.) Is your costume too obtuse?

Are people going to get it or are you going to be explaining all night long? If your interests are on the outskirts of pop culture's radius, you're going to find yourself in a bit of a pickle here. Maybe you feel like you're too smart for everyone else, so you dress up as Charles Darwin. All anyone else is going to see is some old dude. Perhaps you've crafted an absolutely perfect recreation of Val Kilmer in Red Planet. It certainly sucks that nobody is going to give two shits about your spaceman costume.

Seriously, does anyone even know what this fucking movie is about?

Tandem costumes can be a big help. Ichabod Crane is just some awkward dude if he's without his Headless Horseman.

Unless said Ichabod is actually Johnny Depp.

You're already painfully inadequate in everyday life, so try to avoid it at all costs on Halloween. It can be tricky to find someone to go in with on a costume if you're single, so try to focus on a pitch reminding your prospective partner that your hideous face will be obscured by a mask or makeup.

Strangely enough, the inverse is true for girls. Typical costumes for girls want to leave nothing obscured at all. Women are awesome to look at. Agreed, right? But unless you're going out as a stripper or a naked lady, you're not really a master of illusion.

Ah, I see what you did there.

All I'm saying is that if you buy a costume that has the word "sexy" in its title, you should spend the entire night only getting your own drinks and never letting them out of your sight. It falls into the cliched saying of, "Why buy the cow, when you can ogle her tits to death?"


3.) Did you plan ahead?

This is an issue with pretty much every holiday. If you want people to look at you and think, "that guy isn't a retard" then you have to get out in front of this whole Halloween business. In much the way that you will get broken up with over birthdays/anniversaries/Valentine's Day/X-mas/New Year's/Super Bowl/Arbor Day, no one will ever talk to you again if you try to bullshit your way through Halloween. I'm warning you right now not to be lazy. Costume shops are positively swamped and Walmart just plain runs out. If you don't pay attention, you're going to be standing in the aisle, looking at the meager pickings left, and trying to decide if you should go as the Power Ranger missing a mask or as the Little Mermaid that's three sizes too small.

Sadly, I think this was planned in advance.

And don't lie to yourself about what you'll be able to manage. No experience with metallurgy? Then maybe don't pick a costume that requires you to forge the Shards of Narsil or Gondorian armor or some shit.

Out of your league.

4.) Do you even have a party to go to?

Let's hope after all of this work that you have at least one friend who's throwing a party or you're going to a contest at a bar. But if you're reading this, you're probably lazy because you need so much help with the holiday to begin with, so it follows that you're friends are probably lazy, too. It looks like it's up to you to party your way out of this one.

Spuds Mackenzie to the rescue!

There are certain dos and don'ts that must be adhered to when throwing a Halloween party. Here's a quick run down:

You must make a Halloween playlist and, yes, Thriller needs to be included on it. You absolutely need to put dry ice in the punch bowl so it steams up all spooky like. A fog machine can be used and if done correctly, a strobe light or blacklight may be added for subtle effect. Just remember that seizures and semen stains aren't good icebreakers at a party....although later on they may be a good sign that your party was off the fucking hook, yo.

You're party is most likely OK in this case.

It is crucial that you never purchase and display and novelty Halloween motion sensor bullshit. This means no candy bowls with fake hands that grab you when all you want is a Tootsie Roll and nothing that hangs on the wall, laughs at you when you walk by, and then launches into some asinine song. I don't need a trussed up fast food window speaker yelling at me because I'm walking down the hall for another beer.

It's totally a good idea to turn the front of your home into a haunted house to terrify little kids. They need to learn that nothing in life is free and that if you really want that fun-size Twix, well you're going to have to pay for it in nightmares and wet pants. When I was little, there was a house where they put a scarecrow out front in a chair and the candy bowl in his lap. Seems nice except the scarecrow was actually a live person and when you went for that candy, he jumped up and chased you with a hatchet. Sometimes another person was under his porch and would grab at your ankles when you tried to run.

This is what happened when I Google Imaged
"scarecrow hatchet" and I'm on board 100%.

LP out.