Posted on by Storytime with John

A Hollow Halloween

Well guys I was waiting till the shame subsided…but it doesn’t look like it will any time soon…so I am going to go ahead and tell you what happened to me during Halloween of this year!

I didn’t go all out – not in the slightest in fact, however last year I did, I picked up a fake muscular chest-piece thingy, and a red martial arts costume…styled my hair in a crazy way, and really put my all into the persona! I was Paul Phoenix from the Tekken series. But no one, not even a singular human, realized this. Instead they thought I was some guy from Dragonball Z, and in the end I just agreed with them – despite having never really watched that cartoon…

Halloween

Here I am, with my deer friend, Ann

(Halloween 2013)

I had a few ideas this year…but before I knew it, the night was upon us! And I had nothing, repeat – NOTHING! So what did I do? Well took to Google of course! He is my companion through all walks of life…guiding me, and filling in my major gaps in knowledge that I possess in just about every subject. So I typed in something like…easy men’s Halloween costumes…I wasn’t impressed, they looked shit for one, but also they took a lot of work – I was looking for something that I could just out together in the house, out of like…foil…and…toilet paper…something that was at hand, and didn’t take effort basically. So I tried…very, very easy men’s Halloween costume…I stared at it, and added…last minute.

The search brought up quite a few positive results. Mainly jokey ones, that played on puns – which is basically saying; “yeah, I made no effort – but that’s what I was going for…so leave me alone…”

Mistake Shit GIF

I had gave some thought to going as Two-Face from Batman…you know, like draw all over one side of my cheek – and perhaps pat flour onto one half of a suit…but then that would surely ruin a suit, right? Nerrrr, pass on that! That’s when an image of Jim Halpert, from The Office popped up on my screen…it was from one of the Halloween episodes, in this one he had written BOOK across his face – so he could say that he had came as Facebook! I thought – YES! That is shit, but funny enough to get me off the hook! I would wear clothes similar to his, so that it worked on two levels…perhaps at the party some people would want to have a conversation about which version we prefer, and blah blah blah…it’s basically a conversation starter! What a great idea! Thanks Jim, you old dog, you!

So I was all dressed up, in a business-ish suit – a la Jim Halpert – and reached for a huge marker pen so I could etch out the giant letters across my face…it suddenly felt like it was a stupid idea, but not like haha stupid – more just plain moronic. I went for it anyway.  The first thick black line looked awful…but I thought it would get better…I carried on until I was staring at myself in the mirror…argh…KOOB…huh? So FaceKOOB?! I’d went, and done it the wrong way around…so had to scrub, and scrub, and scrub my sensitive skin until the PERMANENT (oops!) marker decided to come off…

It really, really hurt…it took a lot of convincing, and left me with red-raw cheeks…

Crying Space Man GIF

Perhaps I could turn this around in my favor? Perhaps I could go as…errr…like Pikachu, or Santa Claus…or somebody else that has red cheeks…hmm…

I decided I needed to commit – don’t get excited, I mean commit to the character…not…you know. Although to be honest rolling up in this state would be definite social suicide. Whatever, Who cares? I drew BOOK onto my burning face, and then bounced out of the door before I changed my mind.

At the bus stop I wondered why I had drawn all over my face, when I could have easily just brought the pen with me, and did it all last second. I could have just been a guy in a suit, just trying to go a place – no questions asked…but instead I was the weirdo attracting stares from the entire population of the town.I looked back at them, and nodded…tried an awkward smile, but their faces curled, and contorted as they tried to make sense of what was going on.  I lasted about fifteen minutes, which took a lot – but finally broke…I turned away, walked into a dark corner…and began licking my hand, and scrubbing relentlessly at my cheeks…then checking the reflection of my phone…then more saliva…more scrubbing…phone…then saliva…scrub…phone…saliva…cuffs of my jacket…phone

I seriously hate scrubbing, I don’t think I’ll ever scrub a day in my life again.

Scrub GIF

Unsurprisingly the stares still continued. I got on the bus, and made use of the window’s reflection to perfect my makeover back to my…err, natural look. I didn’t really care much that my cheeks looked like rashers of bacon, after all at social functions I always go red anyway…it’s just so embarrassing meeting people, and telling them about how saliva has been a key part of your night so far. Well, maybe I should just no say anything about that – but you know…I WILL. 

I took a deep breath, and walked through the door.

Fortunately my old friend Tequila was there too…so the night turned out better than expected…I just let people come up to me, and guess what I was – whatever they said was correct. Best thing was most thought I had made a real effort…I suppose in a manner of speaking I had been through a lot of trouble!

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41 Replies to “A Hollow Halloween”

  2. I swear this wasn’t me, but last year there was a house whose residents had decided to paint ‘SANTA STOP HERE’ on their front window, which faced onto the main road into town. But they’d decided to be clever and paint it backwards. It was a shame that they didn’t realise they’d also need to reverse the order. So, on to inside it would have read ‘SANTA STOP HERE’…with the letters back to front, from the road it read ‘EREH POTS ATNAS’ which is an unusual sentiment to share with the town.
    From the way it was up until way past 6th January I also think they may have come to regret using gloss to paint onto their windows!
    (You don’t have family who live in Kings Lynn, do you?)

    Liked by 2 people

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  4. I didn’t go all out – not in the slightest in fact, last year I did, I picked up a fake muscular chest-piece thingy, and a red martial arts costume…styled my hair in a crazy way, and really put my all into the persona! I was Paul Phoenix from the Tekken series. But no one, not even a singular human, realized this. Instead they thought I was some guy from Dragonball Z, and in the end I just agreed with them – despite having never really watched that cartoon…..

    John, above is what you described your costume – where is the picture? Prove it! That’s what I want to see. I am sure we would love it 🙂

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  5. No other holiday can cause me stress like Halloween…The expectations are staggering! I applaud you, good sir, for braving the elements and coming through with at the very least a great story for us!

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      1. It kinda seems obvious to me…but it could also be Krillin from DBZ, only with hair.
        I had a severe problem with video games and manga a few years back which means I know most video game and anime characters. It was fun.

        Liked by 1 person

      2. Well people were calling things out, and taking photos with me…thinking I was some guy from Dragonball Z…so yeah, you would be forgiven for that one!

        I had similar problems, fun indeed! 😀

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  10. Whenever I see a red torn gi, I immediately think of Ken Masters from Street Fighter. O.O Guess it goes to show where my fighting game loyalties where. Hah! Good costume though!

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  11. So many of my favourite costumes at last minute. There’s the Cereal Killer: you make yourself look crazy(kinda like a serial killer) and stick cereal boxes to your shirt that look like they’ve been torn up. The “Error 404: Costume not found” which you just write on a white t-shirt. And the easiest one: You wear normal clothes and carry around a sign that says “Nudist on Strike”.
    On the plus side, you have a whole year to come up with something now! OH!! Just wear a suit and say you’re Bruce Wayne or any other character that wears a suit! Easy!
    I was going to be an Ewok this year, but I couldn’t find a bear-suit…tragic.

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    1. JULIA! That was a one I came across, and I thought it was GREAT! I was so going to go for it, until I saw the FACEBOOK thing…and was like that’s even easier, and I am even lazier!

      Bruce Wayne was one of the guesses, and again – I just said yup, yup, yup – well guessed! 😉

      Ewok would have been cool! Next year, next year!

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      1. Some of them can be SO funny! They seem like you made no effort, but pun costumes take a lot of thought! People have to get it and think it’s funny. I was a Scaredy Cat last year…people kept calling me Tigger or saying I was a Lion. Granted my long hair was teased pretty big so I did look like a Lion. So eventually I gave up and agreed.
        Next year I will be an Ewok! Maybe I’ll even be in the classroom for my Teaching Practicum and I’ll have to dress up!!! How exciting!

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  12. Haha! I didn’t go all out this year either. I wore my pajamas: Ninja Turtle pajamas. I threw on some leggings and ninja turtle gloves, ninja turtle sunglasses, and out I went. It was a real smash. People thought it was a real costume and I was all: No, dude, these are my pajamas.

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  17. Hysterical – when I was in 11th grade or so…1982….I went as Rael – the main character from Genesis’ The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway…everyone thought I was Eddie Munster (…in retrospect. that was a better choice).

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  19. Brilliant! We had theme parties practically every weekend for a whole year at university and coming up with new costumes on a student allowance caused some real disasters. I remember a particularly hard to shift gypsy moustache drawn on with a laundry marker. Thanks! 🙂

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  21. You should have just gone with the backwards book. That would have been hilarious for everyone when you explained who you were and what you did writing it on you’re face in the mirror 🙂

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