Halloween

Halloween is ostensibly my favorite holiday, but I'm no longer in college anymore, so there's no Boo's Cruise or Baker party to let loose at and no traditional pumpkin drop, so what does it mean to me now? It means trick-or-treating, but from the other side of the looking glass. I'm currently camped at the edge of my house's wireless network range about 100 yards down the hill next to my driveway beside a glowing plastic pumpkin waiting for greedy tykes to roll through and sift through my basket of fun size offerings while grimacing at the lack of options. I don't know what to say to these kids when they take my candy because I honestly don't remember what adults said to me when I trick-or-treated a decade ago. I think they said "nice costume" or some other weird thing that adults say.

I try to be a little scary by wearing my UMASS hoodie and sitting still in my chair so they think I'm a straw dummy or something. Once I tell them I didn't actually go to UMASS they see that I'm a living person who can provide them with sweets. Most of them know the drill: drone out "trick or treat", snatch a treat, then abruptly turn away while mumbling "thanks..." (usually at the prodding of their adult supervision). Some of them brough UNICEF boxes, which I was unprepared for. I hastily took out my wallet and dumped all my change into the slot for the first kid who asked. I didn't think any more were coming, but then three more small girls came by, and all I had left were dollar bills. By the end, I'd even run out of dollar bills and was forced to give away a five. Those orange boxes gobbled up my lunch money...

I only saw one really great costume, which was a robot. This was a great robot; it had traditional cardboard boxes as head stacked on torso which were spray-painted metallic gray. That would've been something on its own, just because it was homemade, but then there were the lights. The lights! On his chest and on the top of his head, they blinked and they flashed and they were the size of genuine buttons. This could could've been an actual robot, no joke.

I think the most awkward moment of the evening was when I was approached by a foursome who halted six feet away from me when I stood from my chair with my basket. They stared at me silently and I stared back. They probably thought I was a creeper, but I was simply waiting for the secret words. I tried to elicit some sort of greeting with a "yeeesss?" and the girl on the end peeped out a little "trick or... treat?" A sense of relief fell about them once I offered my basket in response. I felt like a statue in a Legend of Zelda game that needs to have the right melody played before it to operate. As the group skipped away, the girl who activated me boasted to her parents that she was smart and had passed the test.

I'm just about out of candy. The Skittles went fastest, and I'm not surprised. I'm more of a fruit candy person myself as well. I have to be in the right mood to like chocolate. What did surprise me was just how many kids there are in this neighborhood. These houses were built here in the early nineties, so it appears that all the families that moved here initially to raise children have progressed enough to deploy a substantial fleet of larval, sugar-devouring munchkins.

On another note, Radiohead is good Halloween music. "Kid A" and "In Rainbows" accompanying a holiday with an aura of chilled eeriness? It sounded like a crap shoot to me too. "Motion Picture Soundtrack" has just faded out, so I will too.

Weight issues

The Simpsons high school flashback:
Barney: "You eat so much and never gain weight. How do you do it, Homer?"
Homer: "Must be my metabamolism."

We all know where Homer is now, but I'd always thought myself invincible with regards to staying thin. It turned out that my baccanallean lifestyle finally caught up to me a month ago when I weighed myself and found I'd gained 15 pounds. I'd just thought all my clothes had been shrinking in the wash, but this new weight is as real as the second ticket I have to buy when I take my seat(s) on an airplane. Luckily, I have enough mental fortitude to adapt to the necessary lifestyle change to get back down to my natural weight. These are the immediate steps I've taken so far:

1. Only one bowl of ice cream after dinner, if any.
2. I only eat until I'm stuffed, not beyond stuffed.
3. 25 pushups and 25 situps in the morning and at night. The endorphin rush afterwards alone makes it worth it.
4. No more elevator rides. I walk up 5 flights each morning to work.
5. No more napping. I need to keep burning calories.
6. Only one reuben sandwich per week from the cafeteria at work. I gotta pay tribute to my main man Dr. House, but not at the expense of my health.
7. Using more emphatic arm motions with my Wii remote when playing Madden.

Hey and guess what, none of this stuff has done jack shit. I've gotten used to considering myself a little guy, but who am I fooling anymore. Just look at me. LOOK AT ME.

New voice

This morning, while lifting my cat up to my face for an impromptu nose inspection, I discovered that I have regained my falsetto! After a 10-year absence, it has returned to bless me with the ability to sing along with Beach Boys songs. I spent my shower bleeting out "Emotional Rescue" and "Alive" by the Rolling Stones and Bee Gees, respectively. Every spare - and solitary - moment I get today, I'm going to practice and nurture this gift. They always used to say that one can recover a falsetto after puberty, but I always thought it was empty consolation.

What I'm curious about is how it happened. I choked on my Raisin Bran earlier in the morning and had to cough in an awkward manner. Did I unintentionally clear the cobwebs from my high-register pipes with a well timed bran-flake assault? On a cosmic level, what kind of altruistic act did I perform to deserve this karmic windfall? Maybe I don't regret treating the whole table to dim sum after all. I should go flaunt my money in a social setting again and see if it rains sushi rolls or a baby panda shows up on my doorstep tomorrow.

This caps a pretty good week in which my parents made for dinner whatever I told them to, I scored a killer blazer from H&M, the Sox clinched the AL East division, and I shot a -9 in Wii Golf. That has got to be some kind of record, no joke.