Halloween - A Month Late

Gentlemen,

I do love this post. Valid point brought up by everyone, and it really got my thought machine pumping (why yes, that IS a euphemism!)


I will attempt to point out the flaws in trying to classify a good costume based off a discrete point system.All these points and numbers are too much for me to keep track of, mainly since I can't do math, and absolutely refuse to learn. So my blog will be almost exclusively anecdotal.

I saw someone in a Quail Man costume several Halloweens ago. Quail Man! Brilliant beyond all brilliance. I was stunned at the simplicity of it, yet to me, at that particular party, at that particular moment in time, 44 particular beers deep, it was the perfect costume.

Fast forward 20 minutes. I see another Quail Man costume. This sent me into a fit of rage that would make Achilles look like Richard Simmons. It was so upsetting because I was so enthralled by the originality of Quail Man, that seeing it duplicated just ruined it. It went from being my all-time favorite costume to an overdone cliche in a matter of minutes. To this day I still hate that second guy.

What made it a great costume was clearly the nostalgia factor (henceforth called the n-factor, cause that other word is too long to spell). We all know and love Doug, but probably haven't even thought about it in over a decade (except for Bo Burnham's epic song lyric: "I'm like Doug's friend Skeeter whenever I see her/Cause I skeet her so hard people call her Patty Mayonnaise).

You can't underestimate the n-factor. Case in point, this year, I bought red sweatpants, a red long sleeve t-shirt, and a red t-shirt and mask from Hot Topic a few days before Halloween. I knew it would be a terrible costume: store bought, cheap, not much thought into it. However, that night, no less than 10 people asked to get pictures with me. What store bought costume could elicit this reaction, you ask?

The one and only Jason, the Red Ranger.

It was epic. But to me, it was a throwaway costume, and I was expecting to be a huge bust. This overturns Moran's notions (and my previous notions) about thoughtfulness, store bought, cliche, etc.


I think trying to set a scoring system for Halloween would take mathematicians and and string theorists centuries to crack, and it still may be a fruitless endeavor.

Colls I hope you appreciate this, but I take the Potter Stewart approach to great Halloween costumes: I know it when I see it.

Quick aside: the best costume I have ever seen was last year. A guy at Landsdowne Pub had created a fully functioning Citgo sign. It was a work of engineering genius, let alone Halloween genius.

This gentleman finished second in the costume contest. To none other than Taryn Coster, and her Crazy Cat Lady costume. True story.


Potter