I'm an Evergreen grad and one of the greatest things about going to TESC is that you can buy products--shirts, cups, stuffed toys--with the school mascot emblazoned on them and give them to your relatives for gifts. I really enjoyed giving my small cousin a stuffed geoduck.

I dislike holidays that are supposed to be fun, but never seem to be fun. New Year's Eve, July 4, and Halloween just make me stressed.

New Year's Eve, July 4, and Halloween just make me stressed.

I would think that most folks would get stressed out by thanksgiving(dry turkey anxiety, where to seat everyone...), and Xmas(what to buy who, how much to spend...) So I am curious at to why those 3 seemingly benign holidays you listed stress you out?

why those 3 seemingly benign holidays you listed stress you out?

I must concur w/ Karlita on this. I think the reason is because July 4 and New Year's Eve especially are kinda party holidays. Especially when you're in your 20s, there is (or was for me anyway) a lot of pressure to feel like you need to go get drunk and create havoc in the streets. Of course, seasoned drinkers refer to those holidays as Amateur Night, and indeed, when I was a professional drinker, I dreaded New Year's Eve. Everyone is on such a focused mission to get shit-ass drunk that it really gets in the way of spontaneous fun. Then by the time midnight rolls around, you're having to listen to people who don't usually drink go into weepy, confessional mode. Plus the bars are overcrowded with obnoxious drunk losers (unlike me; I was a really refined drunk).

I dreaded Halloween perhaps less than New Year's Eve, but it was still a drag. For one thing, much like fireworks, I just find the whole costume thing really unamusing. It always made me feel like a total outcast freak because I am so clearly lacking whatever it is that causes people to find that sort of thing entertaining. And yet some of the people I admire are people that really get into Halloween. So I don't know what to think.

I think that Xmas and Thanksgiving, by contrast, are supposed to be fun in a family fellowship sort of way. Sure there is the gift-giving anxiety, but the obnoxiousness of Xmas is spread out over a whole month, as opposed to just one night. That's my two cents' worth.

Come to think of it, I don't think there are any holidays that I particularly enjoy or look forward to, aside from just getting the day off from work. Maybe I need to take a Zoloft or something.

Karlita- as a New Orleanian, do you lump Mardi Gras in with the other annoying holidays? I've never been to one, but I envision a bunch of severely drunk yuppies and a lot of full frontal nudity that you wish you hadn't seen, and a sea of plastic cups littering the streets.

dry turkey anxiety

I'm finding that phrase really funny for some reason.

DRY TURKEY ANXIETY

There is no greater shame for a Julia Childs generational standard AmeriKan house wife than presenting over cooked dry white breast meat to the family at the holiday meal. Stake it !

The majority of people who seem to "go out" on new years eve: take a look in a restaraunt, and all you see is loser introvert suburban goons in dress up, having there one night out a year, cause that what you are supposed to do right?

Fuck that shit, House party or bust.

I like Holloween. I'm into that whole "get out of yourself by getting a costume thing. Somehow, that seems like a useful and semi-universal impulse. But...

Let's just keep it down to just the one day, shall we? Last week, tons of people in this office were going apeshit for The Big Day. The whole office was fully Holloweened out by lunch on Tuesday. Crazy decorations, buckets of candy everywhere. The enforced-fun-at-the-office-party aspect of these holidays is a real drag for me. Once again, I felt like everyone here in LA is perpetually 13 years old.

I took Friday off and the wife and I drove out to a HOUSE PARTY WEEKEND in the desert out past Twentynine Palms. That was pretty fun. This morning I found an email in my box from a like-minded companyero who failed to stay out of the office on Friday:

Sent: Friday, October 31, 2003 12:04 PM
Subject: I can't believe you aren't here right now.

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

Halloween.

Yale summed it up. I think of those three holidays as forced-fun holidays. I always feel like I should be having more fun and that other people are definitely having more fun than me. That said, I've had some really memorable Halloweens and New Year's Eves.

Strangely, I like Christmas and Thanksgiving. Most of my family lives in Wisconsin so those holidays usually involve my immediate family and some friends.

I've never been to one, but I envision a bunch of severely drunk yuppies and a lot of full frontal nudity that you wish you hadn't seen, and a sea of plastic cups littering the streets.

Dave should chime in on this as well, but I LOVE Mardi Gras. There's a distinct difference between Mardi Gras for tourists and Mardi Gras for locals. I rarely venture into the French Quarter during Mardi Gras, but instead watch the parades Uptown with the locals. I'm an introvert, but for two weeks of the year, I scream for beads at the top of my lungs. Plus, there's all sorts of wonderful, weird things that are associated with Mardi Gras: Mardi Gras Indians, Zulu coconuts, having a drink at 9 am while waiting for Zulu, King Cakes, two days of vacation, tons of music, costumes. We've seen so many parades that we know every single middle and high school band in southern Louisiana. New Orleans is probably one of the only places where playing the tuba is cool.

We had visitors from Seattle and Portland last year and I think they thought it wouldn't be very much fun. By the end, they were knocking little kids out of the way to get more beads. Don't feel sorry for the little kids- they can be monsters at these parades. I extend an invitation to all Yalestar readers to stay with us during Mardi Gras.

Excuse me,

But are all of you people serial killers? Devout christians maybe? Probably of a very conservative sort, like Mormons, mid-west lutherans, Amish or something of a northern European flavor? (Scratch the Mormons, at least they are down with plural marriages) Anti-social to a self-hating degree? Are you all the Unabomber?

I'll grant you Turkey Day and Xmas can be tres stressful. If it ain't the spending, it's the family.
But Halloween, New Years and Mardi Gras? They're all fucking paganistic in nature. Ya aren't S'POSED to be yourself. The whole idea is to lose YOURSELF and become a part of the WHOLE. Why do ya think drink/drugs, music, sex, Holy Rollers, bungee-jumping, big wave surfing, ALL FUCKING ART, and anything that's remotely ecstatic are all such big numbers on the Hit Parade? Conciousness-expanding, ego-destroying, soul-baring, etc, they're all part of the basic human urge to be fucking FREE of yourself, your fears, your inhibitions, to be someone besides who you are every-goddamn-day of your life. To be someone or something else than the persona that you know as yourself and the YOU that other people see as you. To be a part of something BIGGER, whether it be nature, the Universe, or the crowd of people that surrounds us, every single one of them a fellow prisoner of their own skin, also making another attempt at a JAILBREAK, even if it's only for a few precious minutes of AWOL freedom.

I LOVE Halloween, cuz it's an excuse to be different, to not be me. I love the slight warping of reality (Is that a brilliant subtle costume that has PERFECTLY captured the look of a Thai teen prostitute? Or...). I love that for a day the rules are breakable, appearances are NOT reality, and the surreal is expected.

I LOVE Mardi Gras for the same reasons. Sure, it's a tourist hell for weeks leading up to Fat Tuesday in the French Quarter, but around the rest of New Orleans, and on Fat Tuesday itself, it's a different story. Zulu, the oldest black krewe, parades just before Rex, the "King Krewe of Mardi Gras", and every year, despite Rex's complaints, they roll late, and take their sweet time. The guy on the white horse wearing silver tights, a helmet with a white feather plume and a mask of silver lame throwing doubloons out to the crowd? He's your next-door neighbor. It's a LAW that every Krewe member riding on a float MUST be masked. On Fat Tuesday, the locals and those who truly understand the importance of a mask, a costume, of not-being-you take over the French Quarter. And it is beautiful.

Damn.

David Roughs

guy on the white horse wearing silver tights, a helmet with a white feather plume and a mask of silver lame throwing doubloons out to the crowd? He's your next-door neighbor.

He really was our next door neighbor--so we couldn't mock the parade's theme too loudly. "Sauntering through Sondheim" is just sad.

Yup,

Sad. and they're cups (they all throw out plastic cups) sucked.

But seeing him stop and say hello to his two little girls was darn cute.

David Roughs

p.s. Please excuse the freak-out above. I don't really think you all are the Unabomber. Really.

I must say, Dave makes a strong case.

PartyTheFuckOn people.

And for the record: I think Yale very well could be connected to the UnaBomber.

p.s. Please excuse the freak-out above.

Mr. Roughs, I thank you for the fleshing out of my earlier opening paragraph. Your freak-out has me dying to run YOUR wife's open invite past MY wife.

But Halloween, New Years and Mardi Gras? They're all fucking paganistic in nature

Try telling that to the middle-aged lackwits at my workplace. Shit, you'd think Halloween was a Walt Disney creation, or at least an excuse to dress up as your favorite Biblical character.

I do agree with you, but it still isn't anything I want to participate in. Halloween, that is. Mardi Gras on the other hand sounds pretty fucking cool, now that I know it isn't all a MTV Spring Break-style affair.

I think Yale very well could be connected to the UnaBomber.

I hates this technocracy we've created around ourselves! I'm gonna build me a lean-to up Stemple Pass with an iPod as my only luxury. And a cable modem. And occasional RAM and video card upgrades for my G5.

Speaking of G5s, did anyone else read about the Microsoft employee who got fired for posting a photo on his weblog of a shipment of G5s being delivered to Microsoft?

Check it, bleed

To be someone or something else than the persona that you know as yourself and the YOU that other people see as you. ...I LOVE Halloween, cuz it's an excuse to be different, to not be me. I love the slight warping of reality (Is that a brilliant subtle costume that has PERFECTLY captured the look of a Thai teen prostitute? Or...). I love that for a day the rules are breakable, appearances are NOT reality, and the surreal is expected.

That right there is a big part of why Halloween is up there as probably my all-time favorite holiday. I love Halloween. For one night, you can let out a different piece of your personality, part that normally is well submurged, or you can be *completely* different from yourself and try it out for the day.

Christmas and Thanksgiving are highly stressful, so much so that they can become barely enjoyable. Halloween is just for fun, a release, a brief escape from the usual mundane reality.

Halloween gives me a chance to play with costuming and theatrical makeup, something I'm darn good at, without having to resort to pursuing a career in the film industry to have a little fun. I like making caramel corn and other fall goodies, and having the scent of pumpkin around. Plus, I love the cheerfully macabre aspect of it. (The Haunted Mansion is my favorite DisneyWorld ride, though closely followed by Pirates of the Carribbean. Both are considered "darker" rides.) Halloween is a great cover for those of us who like humorously morbid or spooky fun, offering some degree of protection from the "weirdo freak" lable.

Living deep in the south, Halloween is a persecuted holiday. So many small-town preachers and small-minded people harp on the "Halloween is evil" bandwagon, spreading misinformation (such as the everpopular "Halloween is Satan's birthday, and we ain't devilworshippers around here!" battlecry) and trying to abolish the holiday. Halloween parties are already taboo in local schools. While I worked in the children's area of the local public library, so many of these "concerned citizens" voiced their opinions that we were forbidden from decorating with Halloween decorations, reading Halloween-themed books during storytime, and mentioning or reading anything that mentions witches, ghosts, vampires, monsters, and anything that might be considered "occult or magical". I feel as though the zelots are trying to take my holiday away, so I always celebrate it, partly as a bit of a statement. I wear my Halloween shirts proudly a few days before, and on the big day, even if I don't really feel like completely dressing up, I'll at least use freaky eye makeup and maybe wear a big poseable tarantula on my head.

...plus it's always a good excuse to wear fishnets in public. ;)

"unlike me; I was a really refined drunk"

That is EXACTLY how I remember you, Yale!!

I have to admit that I am a bit of a downer when it comes to Halloween myself. I'm pretty sure, however, that I can trace that fact back to a dysfunctional childhood. Every freakin' Halloween, my mom's idea for a costume for my sister and I was to dress as gypsies. Basically, this consisted of wearing mom's makeup and a long-haired wig. Of course it was always so damn cold in Msla, that we had layers of clothes so I looked like a really fat gypsy. There are no words to express how lame I felt. I have several pictures of me around age 7 or 8 glaring at the camera in my stupid "gypsy" getup before a night of begging for candy. Not being a particularly creative soul, I never really ventured out to find a super cool costume, and stopped trick-or-treating at an early age. I also pretty much felt like a dumb-ass dressing up. I'm not good at acting, so it just felt unnatural to "be somebody else." I know a lot of people who have a great time and come up with really fabulous costumes. More power to 'em. I'm just not part of that crowd. Ooohhh welll.........

Yale, perhaps you'll recall the get-ups of the all-time Missoula Halloween master, Mr. Dan Engler. I thought his most brilliant costume was when he dressed up as Lenin encased in a glass tomb. He even had some kind of beer-delivery mechanism rigged up inside of it. And a functioning light! The only problem was going to the terlit ...

I certainly agree with my fellow New Orleans residents re Mardi Gras. While the tourist-soaked Quarter is about as cool as a fannypack full of dicks, the Uptown festivities are fantastic. I can personally attest to the strange psychological change one undergoes when the otherwise mild-mannered are transformed into demonic bead-junkies. And the key to catching throws, Karlita, is to advertantly position yourself amidst a small crowd of screaming half-pints in order to ensure a good heighth advantage. Finally, the coke, pop, soda, study: I am originally from Surry Co. NC and the assertion that folks there overwhelmingly say "pop" is simply preposterous. It has always and forever will be coke.

Hey.

Sorry if this has been hijacked into a Mardi Gras thread, but...

Here's a link to an assortment of pics taken last year. we had two sets of overlapping visitors, so lots of pics were taken.

Mardi Gras Assortment

???s or !!!s, comment or email

David Roughs

Dang! That picture with the Bible dudes and the Huge Ass Beer is unbelievably cool.

about as cool as a fannypack full of dicks

Note to self: be sure and work this simile into conversation while visiting the in-laws...

Yeah,

It was a "must take picture" moment. The Hare Krishna pics didn't turn out, unfortunately. And overhearing a guy on Royal street (a block down from Bourbon St.) on Mardi Gras night yelling into his cell phone (with big-ass beer in hand) "Yeah! I'm on the corner! With the light! And a stop sign!" was, while very humorous, impossible to capture on film.

David Roughs