Halloween 2013

Quick Sidebar:

Remember on 'Laverne & Shirley' when Shirley left the show to pursue a lucrative solo career but they kept the title of the show the same? Well despite the fact that I'm the only one who writes on this blog anymore, I'm keeping the 'Pair' in 'Pair-Ranting'.

Amanda's been too busy to write on the blog lately because she's taking a class on blogging. I think it's safe to call that 'irony'.

Anyway, I'm proud of her and I wish her great success. Who knows, maybe some day her name will as much of a household name as Cindy Williams.

Back to Halloween:

I'm a trend setter! So our first Halloween was waaay back in 2009 when baby Liam was just three months old. Check it out!

Since then the "Sexy Condiment" look is all the rage!! You're welcome mothers.

And NO I'm not a sexy crayon, I'm SEXY MUSTARD. Why would a sexy crayon be with a sexy Hot Dog on a Stick Girl and her hot dog? Moreover, why would something like a "sexy crayon" costume even exist??!!

Ah, okay.

The trends in Halloween costumes didn't used to be quite so puzzling. As a child of the 80's I can recall some definite trends but they all made sense. Things like Freddy Kruger and Jason from Friday the 13th were pretty common, but we did sexy back then too with Madonna and Flashdance.  What the hell is this?

I still have a few years to sort it all out before the boys can start making really bad decisions on their own. It won't be anything like the above, of course (thank god I have sons), but I could see them wearing stuff that's in poor taste and just plain stupid. Until then I intend to impose awesomeness upon them.

Okay, that was last year and it was a complete failure. Look at Liam's face! Erin and I had insisted on the 'Family Costume' for the last two years and the reaction from the boys has ranged from indifference to abject misery. In fact last year, before I caved and bought Liam a t-shirt at the Wurst so he could tear away his vile costume (Luke Skywalker, come on!), the desperation in his cries had me honestly wondering if he was violently allergic to third world polyester. It turned out the force was just seriously not with him.

So this year Erin bought the boys costumes for them. No theme this time, and certainly no dated pop-culture references. They were in heaven.

I can't come up with one way to tie Thomas the Tank Engine to a hamburger. It's just too big of a stretch, but whatever. For now I'll concede. I don't want to ruin Halloween for the boys just yet by forcing them to partake in my fantastic ideas, like dressing as the cast of Monty Python's Holy Grail pushing a giant wooden rabbit. They're young and easily scarred.