The Problem with Reading a la Bret & Jermain

The problem with Bird learning to read is that I ca no longer wear my favorite T-shirt that my friend Will brought me from a Flight of the Conchords concert (never mind that he bought the shirt in a youth size for his son and in his Newcastle stupor he didn't realize that the shirt looked like this).

5:00 Fridays

Funny how all holidays are colored with signature hues. Green and red for Christmas, despite the Ballard Designs and Pottery Barns of the world trying to trick us into adopting purples and blues and pinks. Red, white, and blue for Fourth of July. Brown for Arbor Day. Green for my Half Birthday, I mean St. Patrick's Day. Naturally Halloween conjures up spooky images of black and orange.

Store aisles have been festooned with the color combo since, oh, July (and what a clash with the red, white, and blue!). While the Halloween imagery used to teeter somewhere between cute and creepy, it has turned plain macabre in some places. There seem to be dead dudes with bad hair all over the Target aisles, and even the grocery store has one too many severed hands served up in a candy bowl to make me want to shop for food., at least not meat.

If you people want the creep factor exponentially revved up from years past, who am I to disappoint? These 5:00 Fridays libations are for the over-21 set anyway. If you have nightmares just hum "Love Will Keep Us Together" by Captain & Tennille like I did when I was a kid and got spooked by things that went bump in the night.

Today I bring you an unique concoction from our friends across the pond who speak with a lovely lilt and use the word "mate" as a noun.

Blavod Black Vodka Screwdriver (in the spirit of gory Halloween and revenge, let's pretend that this particular screwdriver bored its way into the brain of the asshole who just made snide racist comments about my friend's adorable little children yesterday...note the use of "bored," yet another homonym!)


2 shots Blavod black vodka
3 ounces pulp free orange juice or tangerine juice
corn syrup or honey
red food coloring

In a shallow dish, mix a couple of tablespoons of corn syrup or honey with several drops of red food coloring. Dip the rim of a highball glass into the mixture. It will drip down the sides like oozing blood. Add ice cubes and orange juice. Slowly pour the Blavod black vodka on top so the orange and black colors are layered. Serve with a straw or swizzle stick. This cocktail is best stirred before drinking, but the layered look packs a punch for Halloween presentation.

Boo!

Halloween, Dirt & Noise Style

I happen to be a big fan of Halloween. I love eating candy, dressing up in costume, being spooked, eating candy, dancing to the Monster Mash, snacking on candy corn mixed with dry roasted peanuts (a deliriously divine treat that my friend @turnaroundart turned me onto!), carving pumpkins, eating candy.

I also happen to look good in orange so I embrace any chance I get to sport it. If I keep on eating candy I just might look like a pumpkin myself one of these days. That'll save me money on my costume I suppose.

The boys of course love Halloween for all the same reasons I do. Mac Daddy hates Halloween for all the same reasons. He detests dressing up, could care less about spooky movies (He flat out laughed at Blair Witch Project whilst I peed in my pants.), hates candy corn, thinks dancing to Monster Mash is dorky, and is painfully uncreative when it comes to carving a jack-o-lantern. Meanwhile I buy pumpkins at every turn and even planted a kitschy scarecrow in our yard. Our table is bedecked with sparkly black and orange place mats, candy corn shaped candles, and plastic spiders. I listen to the Monster Mash station on Pandora and read Halloween stories in creepy voices with much ballyhoo.

I sounded every single one of my 41 years when I proclaimed to the boys that we'd be making our own costumes this year. Their mouths hung agape. And Mac Daddy laughed. Then these preachy words came out of my matronly mouth: "When I was a kid no one bought costumes. We used our imaginations and creativity to make stuff up. We were green without even realizing it. No one wasted money on costumes, even if that meant dressing up as a hobo or the unknown comic every single year of grade school." I must have spoken with authority because no one questioned me...though they clearly questioned my sanity. And for the record, I am the least crafty person I know. Luckily the boys are too young to know how ridiculous they might look, and by the time they figure it out, they will hate me for many more reasons (like the bowl haircut Bird seems to sport in every school picture).

I do hate all the high fructose corn syrup that cannot be avoided without paying an arm and a leg for carob bars or other such crap that the children would toss out with the razor bladed apples and arsenic laced popcorn balls. I wish there were some viable alternatives (stupid tombstone shaped erasers and skull emblazoned super bouncy balls aside). I suppose next year I could serve the fair trade natural stuff and rig up a fake gory arm and leg with a sign stating "I paid an arm and a leg for this candy."

Or I might just put up a sign that says "I paid an arm and a leg for healthcare. Can't afford candy."

In the mean time, I'll be dressed up as Rizzo and trawling the hood for candy. Bird will be a ninja warrior, and Deal will be his own super hero known as Super Deal. Mac Daddy will be dressed up as a corporate cube dweller who works for Da Man.

Wordless Wednesday: OUCH!