Strangers with Candy

A few years ago, it was my dream to be the blond cop from “Super Troopers” for Halloween. I have a friend who looks startlingly like Ramathorn and I wanted us to go to parties together reciting lines from the movie. He had no idea that I intended him to be a part of my costume, but that hardly mattered.

I began my quest for a cop uniform only to find that there are no normal police woman costumes. No, they are all “naughty” cops in hot pants with furry handcuffs. This was not the costume I envisioned (not to mention that it’s far too cold to be traipsing around in hot pants in October).

I have no problem with women using Halloween as an opportunity to dress provocatively. It is, after all, a holiday dedicated to being someone other than yourself. The thing is that I’m feeling a little older, and a little more self-conscious about dressing up in Little Bo Peep’s undergarments in public.

This year, I wanted to be Rainbow Brite. Of course, all of the costumes I’ve found were for “Sexy Rainbow Brite.” If I recall, Rainbow Brite was a cleavage-free little girl who was followed around by a white puffy dog-like animal and filled the world with color and happiness. I’m not sure I want to sport a pushup bra with my rainbow leg warmers.

I mentioned this to one of my married male friends who replied that “all girls should dress like that on Halloween,” and then tried convince his wife to don a mini skirt for the occasion.

Maybe I’m missing the point of Halloween. Maybe it really is just a chance to let out some of our more lascivious fantasies. As a single girl, I guess it’s expected that I would use this opportunity to dress up in a ridiculously pervy costume like “Snow White Hot Pants,” “Tweekerbelle,” or some manner of lingerie with bunny ears and glitter. Can’t I be attractive on Halloween without having to worry if my bikini line is showing though? Is it wrong to not want to freeze my furry bunny tail off all night?

Lesson learned: Again this year, Halloween might find me with a bottle of wine, a scary movie and a bowl of candy that I refuse to share with trick-or-treaters. At least I’ll be warm.

Pickup Lines: A Tale of Terror

One dark night, when the wind was howling (or maybe that was my drunk friend cheering over a shot), I found myself in a very frightening corner of a very seedy little bar. Being dead sober, I watched in horror as my friend babbled incoherently about her cramps to anyone who would listen. I had my face buried in my hands in embarrassment when one of the onlookers of this nightmare came over to talk to/console me.

He was a nice looking guy in his mid-thirties and was polite to my overly enthusiastic friend. I asked him what he did for a living. He told me that a corporate job didn’t suit him, which I have nothing against. However, the reason it didn’t suit him was that it would interfere with his surfing and extreme mountain biking.

I nodded, not sure how to respond to that.

He offered to buy me a drink, but someone had to haul the drunk girl home, so I ordered water.

We walked outside to the patio for fresh air and talked a little about my job while drunk girl struggled with the child-proofing on her lighter. When she had successfully lit her cigarette my attention was divided between the conversation and dodging her erratically swinging hand for fear of having my hair catch on fire.

To get my attention, extreme mountain biker poked me in the arm. I looked down and saw he was missing part of a finger and he was poking me with a stub. Never would I ask someone how they lost a body part, but he held it up and said, “Look, I’m missing a finger.”

I nodded and figured this was an invitation to ask him how he lost said finger.

“It fell off,” he said simply.

Was this an indication of leprosy? Was he like my childhood dolls whose parts popped off randomly? He wouldn’t tell me anymore and I began picture his finger rolling around in a gutter somewhere trying to inch its way back to its owner.

At this point, drunk girl told me she needed to vomit. It was time to go.

“I want to see you again,” he said. I nodded while hauling a woman 6 inches taller and 50 lbs heavier to me to the sidewalk. “Do you want to go see ‘Pearl Harbor’? You’re, like, smart and it’s about history or something.”

Lesson learned: I have nothing against dating men with missing limbs. I do, however, fear dating a man whose appendages randomly fall off, especially when he uses bad pickup lines.