Trick Or Treat
Hello World,
Happy November! I hope that you enjoyed a "spook-tacular" holiday, with fun and treats for bugs and ghouls alike. We find ourselves already on the other side of Halloween, and lived to tell the tale, so that's my idea of a successful holiday right there. You're welcome to look over my shoulder and see how the holiday played out around here, from someone right in the thick of things and a view from the trenches.
Even after all these years, I continue to be surprised by unanticipated costume complications. When I first came up with the idea of the Easter Bunny costume last year, I expected that it would be standard enough that the pieces would be easily assembled by any moron, proving once again, I suppose, that my grip on reality is tenuous at best. This had the effect of lulling me into a false sense of security, so that I didn't start my costume gathering efforts early enough. I discovered that you can easily spend $200 or more on a premium Easter Bunny or rabbit mascot costume from a variety of retailers, but I was having no part of that, and not just for the cost impact. I knew that having a full-body fleecy jumpsuit would be much too hot and unwieldy to wear all day at work, and so was not an option for me. I figured that I could wear a white shirt, white pants and fuzzy white slippers, then all I would need would be the vest, ears, bowtie and tail and I would be all set. What could be simpler?
Not so fast! Although you can scrape together a bunny kit that includes ears, tail and bowtie, there's no place that will sell you an Easter-themed vest for love or money, no matter how hard you look, and believe me, I gave it everything I had. All full Easter Bunny costumes come with a perky vest with designs of eggs, chicks, flowers, rabbits and so on. But no one sells the vests separately, or in fact, any vest with flowers, or even pastel stripes or polka dots, that would have done in a pinch. There are cowboy vests and SWAT team vests, and after that, you're out of luck. I went ahead and bought the ears, tail and bowtie, and luckily the same web site also had a plastic tablecloth with an Easter egg print, so I got that also, and ended up cutting it up to make my own sort of semi-vest-smock affair that would serve the purpose. Because I am an idiot, I didn't check my order sooner to notice that while they sent me a whole box full of things that I would need for other holidays, they left out the one thing I needed for Halloween, namely, the bunny ears, tail and bowtie. So here I was scrambling around pretty much at the eleventh hour to get the rest of my costume parts, and luckily Bill stepped in and saved the day, as he so often does, and rescued my costume from disaster.
We've been having construction crews tearing up the roads for months around the hospital, and even with the flagmen and police officers in the intersections directing traffic, you still take your life in your hands trying to cross the street. I usually walk two blocks out of my way just to duck those intersections with the construction, because I've had too many near misses for my tastes, at the hands of people supposedly protecting the pedestrians. But on Tuesday, I threw caution to the winds and waltzed right up to the corner as bold as brass, and twice as impudent, because after all, I knew (and they knew!) that they couldn't very well run over the Easter Bunny. The police officer on duty said, "Okay, Bugs" and then waved me safely to the other side, although I had to point out that I was technically the Easter Bunny and not Bugs Bunny. Honestly, I don't know what they're teaching them at police academy these days.
It's interesting that you can walk right past people on the street while wearing a bunny costume, and they don't even look at you twice. This is what you call Easter Bunny confidentiality in the healthcare field, and our friends at HIPAA would be so proud. Tuesday turned out to be a quiet day in the Clinic when I walked in, so I caused no sensation in there. In fact, I heard one woman on line say, "Did I just see a rabbit go by?" and everyone else said no. I'm thinking that's about as lack of sensation as you can get in a costume. I was a big hit in Finance, where everyone loved my costume, even Mario the Croatian painter, who was at his usual post on a ladder in the hallway. When I got to my office, one of my co-workers said, "Mad Hatter!" I said to Bill later that there is no costume so iconic that people won't get it wrong, and it's really true that costume appreciation is a lost art. It goes without saying that our newest employee in the department just thought I was a complete nut. Although later, when I was going on my rounds to trick-or-treat, she said, "Bring me back anything that you get!" I had to tell her to please not get her hopes up.
As usual, I stopped by at the parties in the nursing home and Adult Day Care, and they were fun and festive as always. Trick-or-treating at the hospital is a chancy proposition at best, and this was no different, with some departments awash in fun-size candy bars, and others so desperate for candy that I was lucky to get out of there in one piece. In fact, I suffered a net loss of candy bars when I crossed over the courtyard, and a colleague filched two treats from my basket as I walked past. In the Foundation office, they felt bad about having no candy, so they gave me an apple instead, which I was afraid was a little too heavy for the cheesy straw basket that I was using as a costume accessory. Bill said that I had to give out malted milk eggs, being the Easter Bunny and all, but I said that was the opposite of what I wanted, since people should give ME candy because I was the one trick-or-treating. But I happened to have a bag of malted milk eggs, so I gave them out in my travels, and people seemed to enjoy that. (Although our newest employee in Purchasing had apparently never heard of them, and asked me what they were like, and I said to Bill later that I discovered it's practically impossible to explain a malted milk egg to someone who's never had one.) It turned into a kind of a long and tiring afternoon, traipsing around the campus in 70 degree weather wearing a plastic tablecloth and fuzzy slippers, and because I used the shirt and pants I take camping with me, everywhere I went I smelled of suntan lotion. I also made a special trip to the Mental Health department, where I walked up to the receptionist window and said, "I don't know if you can help me. My problem is that I think I'm the Easter Bunny." They laughed.
After work, I hippity-hopped right home, not to mention quick like a bunny, so that Bill could take my picture, and I could get ready for trick-or-treaters beating a path to our door. I was surprised to get our first caller, a toddler dressed as a dinosaur, at 6PM because they usually start later than that. What with the unseasonably warm weather and getting an early start, I thought that would be an indication that we'd be in for a busy night, but that's not how it turned out. We didn't get our next caller until almost 6:30, and after that they tended to come singly or in pairs, rather than in larger groups and closer together. This struck me as a very strange year for costume choices, mostly for what there wasn't, rather than what there was. Last year I had a run on witches, and this year I didn't have a single one until the last group of youngsters at 8:45. That was also when I had my one and only Jason and Scream, and I had no Michael Myers at all, which are usually more well represented. I didn't have a single ghost, wizard, Superman (and isn't there a new movie of that?), Spiderman, SpongeBob SquarePants, or any of the various Star Wars characters. What I had the most of was 6 pirates, 4 Ninjas, 4 vampires, 4 princesses, 3 angels, 3 skeletons, 3 genies, 2 Tinkerbells, 2 Batmans and 2 devils. Although truth to tell, the angels and devils were actually two and a half each, because one girl was dressed as a combination angel-devil. The single costume choices ran the gamut, including a clown, a fireman, a policeman, a king, a cowgirl, alien, zombie, bunny, Scooby Doo, Cookie Monster, Elmo, Little Bo Peep, Zorro, Freddy Kruger, a Viking and a girl dressed as a boy. There was also an infant dressed in a costume that the family variously described, in broken English and mysterious hand gestures, as either a cat or a cow, I couldn't tell which. My favorite costume of the night was a girl who came as a Desperate Housewife, complete with cold cream, curlers and a ratty terrycloth bathrobe. Did I laugh!
When the dust finally settled, we had 82 callers, and while I hate to complain because I know people who have none, I still thought with the weather as mild as it was, that we would have more. Of course, we all know that left-over Halloween candy is always popular at work, where they will eat anything that isn't nailed down and stops moving long enough for them to catch it. In fact, earlier in the day at work, I thought I noticed someone following me around with a knife and fork and muttering something about "hassenpfeffer" under their breath, but I'm sure I must have been mistaken.
Happy November! I hope that you enjoyed a "spook-tacular" holiday, with fun and treats for bugs and ghouls alike. We find ourselves already on the other side of Halloween, and lived to tell the tale, so that's my idea of a successful holiday right there. You're welcome to look over my shoulder and see how the holiday played out around here, from someone right in the thick of things and a view from the trenches.
Even after all these years, I continue to be surprised by unanticipated costume complications. When I first came up with the idea of the Easter Bunny costume last year, I expected that it would be standard enough that the pieces would be easily assembled by any moron, proving once again, I suppose, that my grip on reality is tenuous at best. This had the effect of lulling me into a false sense of security, so that I didn't start my costume gathering efforts early enough. I discovered that you can easily spend $200 or more on a premium Easter Bunny or rabbit mascot costume from a variety of retailers, but I was having no part of that, and not just for the cost impact. I knew that having a full-body fleecy jumpsuit would be much too hot and unwieldy to wear all day at work, and so was not an option for me. I figured that I could wear a white shirt, white pants and fuzzy white slippers, then all I would need would be the vest, ears, bowtie and tail and I would be all set. What could be simpler?
Not so fast! Although you can scrape together a bunny kit that includes ears, tail and bowtie, there's no place that will sell you an Easter-themed vest for love or money, no matter how hard you look, and believe me, I gave it everything I had. All full Easter Bunny costumes come with a perky vest with designs of eggs, chicks, flowers, rabbits and so on. But no one sells the vests separately, or in fact, any vest with flowers, or even pastel stripes or polka dots, that would have done in a pinch. There are cowboy vests and SWAT team vests, and after that, you're out of luck. I went ahead and bought the ears, tail and bowtie, and luckily the same web site also had a plastic tablecloth with an Easter egg print, so I got that also, and ended up cutting it up to make my own sort of semi-vest-smock affair that would serve the purpose. Because I am an idiot, I didn't check my order sooner to notice that while they sent me a whole box full of things that I would need for other holidays, they left out the one thing I needed for Halloween, namely, the bunny ears, tail and bowtie. So here I was scrambling around pretty much at the eleventh hour to get the rest of my costume parts, and luckily Bill stepped in and saved the day, as he so often does, and rescued my costume from disaster.
We've been having construction crews tearing up the roads for months around the hospital, and even with the flagmen and police officers in the intersections directing traffic, you still take your life in your hands trying to cross the street. I usually walk two blocks out of my way just to duck those intersections with the construction, because I've had too many near misses for my tastes, at the hands of people supposedly protecting the pedestrians. But on Tuesday, I threw caution to the winds and waltzed right up to the corner as bold as brass, and twice as impudent, because after all, I knew (and they knew!) that they couldn't very well run over the Easter Bunny. The police officer on duty said, "Okay, Bugs" and then waved me safely to the other side, although I had to point out that I was technically the Easter Bunny and not Bugs Bunny. Honestly, I don't know what they're teaching them at police academy these days.
It's interesting that you can walk right past people on the street while wearing a bunny costume, and they don't even look at you twice. This is what you call Easter Bunny confidentiality in the healthcare field, and our friends at HIPAA would be so proud. Tuesday turned out to be a quiet day in the Clinic when I walked in, so I caused no sensation in there. In fact, I heard one woman on line say, "Did I just see a rabbit go by?" and everyone else said no. I'm thinking that's about as lack of sensation as you can get in a costume. I was a big hit in Finance, where everyone loved my costume, even Mario the Croatian painter, who was at his usual post on a ladder in the hallway. When I got to my office, one of my co-workers said, "Mad Hatter!" I said to Bill later that there is no costume so iconic that people won't get it wrong, and it's really true that costume appreciation is a lost art. It goes without saying that our newest employee in the department just thought I was a complete nut. Although later, when I was going on my rounds to trick-or-treat, she said, "Bring me back anything that you get!" I had to tell her to please not get her hopes up.
As usual, I stopped by at the parties in the nursing home and Adult Day Care, and they were fun and festive as always. Trick-or-treating at the hospital is a chancy proposition at best, and this was no different, with some departments awash in fun-size candy bars, and others so desperate for candy that I was lucky to get out of there in one piece. In fact, I suffered a net loss of candy bars when I crossed over the courtyard, and a colleague filched two treats from my basket as I walked past. In the Foundation office, they felt bad about having no candy, so they gave me an apple instead, which I was afraid was a little too heavy for the cheesy straw basket that I was using as a costume accessory. Bill said that I had to give out malted milk eggs, being the Easter Bunny and all, but I said that was the opposite of what I wanted, since people should give ME candy because I was the one trick-or-treating. But I happened to have a bag of malted milk eggs, so I gave them out in my travels, and people seemed to enjoy that. (Although our newest employee in Purchasing had apparently never heard of them, and asked me what they were like, and I said to Bill later that I discovered it's practically impossible to explain a malted milk egg to someone who's never had one.) It turned into a kind of a long and tiring afternoon, traipsing around the campus in 70 degree weather wearing a plastic tablecloth and fuzzy slippers, and because I used the shirt and pants I take camping with me, everywhere I went I smelled of suntan lotion. I also made a special trip to the Mental Health department, where I walked up to the receptionist window and said, "I don't know if you can help me. My problem is that I think I'm the Easter Bunny." They laughed.
After work, I hippity-hopped right home, not to mention quick like a bunny, so that Bill could take my picture, and I could get ready for trick-or-treaters beating a path to our door. I was surprised to get our first caller, a toddler dressed as a dinosaur, at 6PM because they usually start later than that. What with the unseasonably warm weather and getting an early start, I thought that would be an indication that we'd be in for a busy night, but that's not how it turned out. We didn't get our next caller until almost 6:30, and after that they tended to come singly or in pairs, rather than in larger groups and closer together. This struck me as a very strange year for costume choices, mostly for what there wasn't, rather than what there was. Last year I had a run on witches, and this year I didn't have a single one until the last group of youngsters at 8:45. That was also when I had my one and only Jason and Scream, and I had no Michael Myers at all, which are usually more well represented. I didn't have a single ghost, wizard, Superman (and isn't there a new movie of that?), Spiderman, SpongeBob SquarePants, or any of the various Star Wars characters. What I had the most of was 6 pirates, 4 Ninjas, 4 vampires, 4 princesses, 3 angels, 3 skeletons, 3 genies, 2 Tinkerbells, 2 Batmans and 2 devils. Although truth to tell, the angels and devils were actually two and a half each, because one girl was dressed as a combination angel-devil. The single costume choices ran the gamut, including a clown, a fireman, a policeman, a king, a cowgirl, alien, zombie, bunny, Scooby Doo, Cookie Monster, Elmo, Little Bo Peep, Zorro, Freddy Kruger, a Viking and a girl dressed as a boy. There was also an infant dressed in a costume that the family variously described, in broken English and mysterious hand gestures, as either a cat or a cow, I couldn't tell which. My favorite costume of the night was a girl who came as a Desperate Housewife, complete with cold cream, curlers and a ratty terrycloth bathrobe. Did I laugh!
When the dust finally settled, we had 82 callers, and while I hate to complain because I know people who have none, I still thought with the weather as mild as it was, that we would have more. Of course, we all know that left-over Halloween candy is always popular at work, where they will eat anything that isn't nailed down and stops moving long enough for them to catch it. In fact, earlier in the day at work, I thought I noticed someone following me around with a knife and fork and muttering something about "hassenpfeffer" under their breath, but I'm sure I must have been mistaken.
posted by El Tango Fandango @ 7:14 PM
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