...and Frog.

I just got totally reprimanded.

I have a friend…well, we’ll call him a friend and a FAN…who just sent me an email telling me I HAVE to blog more, because he’s sick of getting all excited for the latest installment, and then sorely disappointed when there’s the same, stupid (albeit cute) picture staring back at him that has been there since the 15th of October.

For shame.

So friends, fans, and people looking to procrastinate - I’m going to attempt to hurtle the obstacle of writer’s block, and please the masses with something we can all enjoy: a little ditty in honor of Halloween…

About a week ago, I was introduced to this: http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1715915


Do yourself a favor, watch that (NSFW!), and then come back to me.



Are you dying of laughter? Good.

That, of course, it supposed to be a satirical commercial – poking fun at several things that I, too, like to poke fun at, such as: Hackensack, NJ, guys who are constantly yelling, home-made, low budget commercials (Bob’s Discount Furniture), and…sexy Halloween costumes.

I giggled last week, because I thought this was the ultimate in ridiculous. “Sexy 1800’s Steel Conglomerate Tycoon?!”, I thought. And then…I went costume shopping.

Let me preface this by saying that I am not a Halloween person. I loved it when I was little because of the candy – now I loathe it because of the candy. I loved it when I was younger because of the costumes – now I can’t comfortably wear sweatpants and a winter coat under them anymore. I loved it when I had a neighborhood, friends and a plan of attack – now, I have a neighborhood, friends, and no clue what to do with either.

Over it.

That said, Halloween is on a Saturday this year, and when a friend of mine told me to “enjoy Haloween while I can, because I could be in the ‘burbs answering doors next year for all I know”, I decided to motivate.

Last year, I borrowed a “beer wench” costume from a friend, which included a very little skirt, and a corset. I was all T&A, and although that’s not normally my scene, I enjoyed being like every other American woman for once; using Halloween as an excuse to be extremely underdressed.

As fun as it was to have cleavage, this year, I decided I wanted to be clothed.

So after work the other day, I went where any red-blooded New Yorker goes in search of some fake red blood: Ricky’s.

Ricky’s is another NYC phenomenon. It’s supposedly a beauty supply store, but it seems to carry everything but (and possibly including) the kitchen sink. Around Halloween, it turns into a costume superstore. Much like Duane Reade, there is a Ricky’s on practically every corner in New York. If a Baby Gap closes down, a Ricky’s takes its place. If a bodega shuts its doors, Ricky’s is there the next day. You get my point.

This year, Ricky’s leased a space in the Financial District, strictly for Halloween costumes. I figured this was a sure bet.

Not 3 feet through the door and I had to phone a friend to share the experience. The place was wall-to-wall SEXY. It was like that commercial! Sexy little bags of sexy little costumes as far as the eye could see. Sexy fairy. Sexy Dora the Explorer. Sexy Nun. Sexy SpongeBob Square Pants. Sexy Pirate. Sexy Kate Gosslin?!

Oh, and Frog.

I nearly died.

Turns out, the commercial isn’t satirical at all. It’s honest. Girls were fighting for this stuff! Grabbing at thigh-highs, ripping garters out of each other’s hands, clawing for sexy devil horns, bunny ears and bumblebee antennae. Every chick in there had armfuls of lycra and fishnet, fake eyelashes and glitter. It was a swarm of estrogen…all fighting for the costume that would make their one night of looking like a hooker worth all the fuss.

Although I’m sure I would look ravishing in a prison uniform with the midriff cut out of it, I didn’t feel like getting cat-clawed in the face by some over-zealous financial type in a power suit just dying to let her hair down. So I cruised the aisles, stepping over the debris of feather boas, fake fingernails, and the occasional clear plastic platform shoe, looking for a costume that didn’t carry the potential of having a nipple slip.

I kid you not when I say that “frog” was my only option. I seriously thought I was on Candid Camera.

Are there really no other options? 900 costumes to chose from, and unless I feel like having my butt cheeks exposed to October weather, I have the option of…frog?

Don’t get me wrong, I love frogs. I’d love to BE a frog. But not for $85 – which is how much the FELT costume was.

(Next blog idea: the TOTAL price extortion of Halloween / Halloween costumes)

At some point, my world started to slow down in the way that Tom Hank’s world slowed in the opening D-Day scene of Saving Private Ryan. And not to belittle D-Day by comparing it to Halloween costume shopping, but this was…war. Women were fighting, and running, and carrying (plastic) guns and knives and swords. Little grenades of costumes were going off left and right. And there I was, phone to my ear, stumbling around – just trying to get out of there alive – with a costume that was not the equivalent of a bra and panties.

When I came out of the fog, and life was no longer in slow-motion, I was in front of the wigs. I shook my head, got my bearing, and stared up at the Great Wall of Hair. Blond, brown, pink, green, long, short, curly…again, overwhelming. Again, sexy!

I turned to leave – defeated.

Just then, I caught something out of the corner of my eye: the un-sexiest thing in the entire store…a Joan Jett wig.

Now don’t get all in a bunch, you Joan Jett fans – I’m sure she had her sexy days and she’s totally badass, don’t get me wrong. But on no planet, in any decade, is it/was it ever acceptable – let alone sexy – to have choppy spiky mullet hair. No amount of tight leather can make that sexy.

In other words, with that wig, I had found my costume.

However, the question still remains: will I venture out of my apartment tomorrow night to be the only fully clothed woman in a sea of sexy?

Stay tuned…


And p.s. - The pic? Circa 1990. I believe that aside from Joan Jett, dressing up as "Halloween" (far left) might be the un-sexiest costume of all time. Good thing, too...we were 10.