In pursuit of Halloween Fame

Ruh roh. Halloween is around the corner!

Every year my employer throws a Halloween contest, which I always enter. This is my illustrious costume record so far:

1999: Retro Space Girl (Best Sci-Fi Costume. Image not available.)
This consisted of sparkly antennas, a purple wig, sparkly minidress, sparkly white tights, a poofy silver ski jacket, white gloves, a Jetsons-like triangle collar, and faked go-go boots. Really, it was an excuse to wear go-go boots and a bracelet with fake blinking jewels.

2000: Buttercup, part of the 3-person Powerpuff Girls ensemble (Most Crafty Costume)
I bought the masks and got two girlfriends to help me sew actual minidresses to match the cartoons. We wore white tights and black maryjane shoes. It was RAD. And my dog Squeakers was dressed like a little Super Dog. The sad thing is that two other girls at work tried to be Buttercup but failed miserably. (Muahahahaha!)

2001: Tokyo Girl (No award. Image not available.)
I dressed sort of crazy, with platform shoes, a miniskirt, and a panda hat. If you ever saw the Japanese "Fruits" magazine, you'd understand. Okay, it's a little obscure. Most people probably just thought I was dressed like a lunatic.

My real costume that I wore outside of work, was actually the character of Margaret Yang, from the movie "Rushmore." My then-boyfriend was dressed as Max Fischer, and my Margaret costume didn't make sense without him around.


2002: Fortune Cookie, as part of the 3-person "Panda Express" ensemble (Best Group Costume)
My coworkers dressed as Chinese Takeout (noodles in a box) and a Panda (reusing my panda hat), and I wore white to match the fortune inside the fortune cookie. This was fun, but a little hard to walk around in.

2003: Bert & Ernie (2nd Place, best pair)
After a lot of complaining and disappointment, I finally bullied my boyfriend into sewing and creating Bert & Ernie costumes with me. He is unusually tall and also vary anal, while I am short and rather laid back, so the costume idea seemed only natural.


2004: ???? store-bought costumes? Nothing?

So what to do? I am running out of time to create a costume, so I suggest to my boyfriend that we purchase one this year. He doesn't think it's worth dressing up for, unless we actually make one. Of course this October is a super busy month, so he suggests that we just NOT DRESS UP AT ALL!

Of course, this is the same boyfriend who almost refused to do Bert and Ernie last year. But finally he pulled himself together to help me finish it the night before the Halloween contest.

I didn't get any sleep, stabbed myself with a sewing needle, and all we won was a pair of crappy DVDs (Brown Sugar and Enemy of the State) and movie passes.

But really, it's for the GLORY, as our friend Karen knows. (Good thing she quit the company to give us a better chance for winning some kind of contest award.)

So over the years, I have discovered that the best costumes usually are one of the following:

1. a well known pop-culture character or character team with funny details (Max Fischer/Margaret Yang, Austin Powers/Miss Kensington, Bert/Ernie)

2. a well known, but very dated pop-culture character or character team, who matches surprisingly well with the person in the costume (such as Bert/Ernie, Magnum P.I. or Chips), especially when accompanied by theme music

3. an ordinary object, blown up to be very large (fortune cookie, foozball men, an ID badge)

Any suggestions? Well, I have some ideas. but I don't want to give them away.
(hey! I already gave you major costume tips above!)

(well if you share your ideas, maybe i'll share mine. )

(or not.)

I may have to threaten my boyfriend that he is not coming to Vegas with me if he doesn't come through with the costume plans.