A Halloween and Guy Fawkes Double Feature

Well, Dear Readers, it's been a long time. I seem to keep saying that. (By the way, if you're looking for Bedtime Stories, it's been moved to Classics of the Form.) But here I am again, and I wouldn't for the world miss my Halloween or my Guy Fawkes' Day (Bonfire Night, I'm told, to the initiated), so I've combined them into one glorious post.

For Halloween, I still like to dress up every year to pass out trick-or-treat candy. My family decided long ago that once you were in high school, you became a "halloweenie" if you continued to go trick-or-treating. So, since that time, I've made it my business to dress as something that amuses me. You really only get the chance once a year, so why waste it?

This Halloween, I went as a Communist.


Fortunately I had the Russian hat from my wife's study abroad, as well as the Soviet star to go on it. I rounded it out with a Navy peacoat that I stole once, gloves, jackboots, and a beautiful fake beard. I also put a rolled-up bath towel under my coat to make me fat and jolly.

"Trick or treat," the little kids would say. "Ho, ho, ho," I replied. "Death to Capitalism."

The kids were about five or six and didn't know what I was getting at, but the parents knew all right.

I gave them their candy. "Here's a handout from the State," I said. "Ho, ho, ho." You see, part of the reason for the towel is to pull Santa Claus into the picture a bit. After all, Santa gives free handouts from the State every year, one might contend.

"Thank you," the parents would say as they began to walk away. "Forth the People's State, in the name of Great Lenin," I would reply.

This was all great fun, but the best thing that happened was when a little girl and her daddy were walking away. "He was a pirate," said the little girl. "No, he wasn't a pirate," said the daddy. I would have loved to have been in on the rest of that conversation... how exactly did daddy explain the whole communist situation to his five-year-old daughter? Had I been in his shoes it would have been "Yes, he was a pirate, and a jolly one indeed," and leave it at that.

Of course, Guy Fawkes' is where the real fun is. On Halloween, you don't have an excuse to set anything on fire. But, before the fire must come arts-and-crafts time. So, even though it's rather too late for this year, I'm going to provide you with the knowledge to make a homemade and inexpensive effigy to burn. I call this one the "Yarn Guy".

And off we go.

Start off with a ball of yarn, the thicker the better.


Next, make a squiggle, as shown. These will be the limbs of our Guy.


Do the squiggle several more times, until the limbs start to bulk out nicely.


Now we're going to tie off the limbs at all the major points of articulation: wrists, ankles, shoulders, and so on.


Now, get one of those tomato pincushions.


Cut off the little strawberry thing, and all of the green threads. Then, take a Sharpie marker and draw a scared face on the pincushion. Not a scary face, mind you, but a scared face. Here's mine.


For some reason that keeps coming out sideways, and I can't figure out why. Oh well.

Anyway, next we sharpen a stick at both ends, just like in "Lord of the Flies".


Tie the body of the Guy to the stick.


That came out sideways too... very mysterious.



Take one end of the stick, and impale the tomato-head on it. Be careful, it's easy to accidentally go through the tomato and stick your hand.


And there's the Yarn Guy. All that remains is to ready the necessary implements...



...and burn him.


Well, I'm all Martha Stewarted out. So everybody have a safe and happy Halloween and Bonfire Night in about a year. And one more thing...

Death to Imperialist Pigs, in the name of the mighty Stalin. (Ho, ho, ho!)