Things I Hate About Halloween

I have a rather complicated love/hate relationship with Halloween. On one hand, I enjoy the novelty of the day as well as its status as the first celebration day in the "Hallow-Thanks-Christmas Holiday Trifecta". On the other hand, well... I'll explain:

Mangling of the phrase "Trick or Treat"

No, it's not "Trick of Treat", "Trick and Treat" or, God help me, "Tricking Treat". The conjunction you need there is "or", as in "give me a treat OR I will vandalize something you own, probably your house but maybe your car or lawn donkey as well".

I'm not needlessly getting bogged down in semantics here. In some cultures, greeting home owners with the incorrect phrase gives them the legal right to spit in whatever they throw in your goody sack.

Fun diluted by paranoia

I don't know if this is so much a problem now, but back when I was still Trick-or-Treating (or at least when I was young enough to not look pathetic doing so), news reports warned of all the weirdos who'd do something horrible to the candy they were giving out. We didn't have Snopes.com back then to tell us that it's just a twisted urban legend.

Granted, there were reports of a couple of children dying after eating ingested candy (in the 70's), but it turned out to be part of an intricate cover-up for a targeted murder, not a random act by a sicko. Other coincidental deaths are always attributed to poison candy before any facts are presented. Furthermore, the sharp things supposedly found in candy is usually put inside the treats by the child as a goof. Kids are so stupid sometimes.

There's nothing wrong with being cautious, but when I hear about some poor child who had to stay home while his friends are out on the one day they're actually allowed to accept candy from strangers, I get angrier at the news outlets for their constant spreading of misinformation. Damn liberal and/or conservative media!

The poor design of licensed-character children's costumes.

It's an insult to the intelligence and an affront to a child's imagination when they put the picture or logo of whatever you're supposed to be on the costume's shirt. Kind of kills the illusion, doesn't it?

Here's an example: Suppose you were a stupid child in the early 80's and, after being rescued from the well you had fallen into for the fourth time in as many days, you suddenly decided it'd be a great idea to go as Scott Baio as his Chachi character from Joanie Loves Chachi. After mom stops sobbing uncontrollably, your parents go out and get you one as pictured to the right. Notice the problems? First, the Chachi chacter never broke the fourth wall and wore the name of the show as part of his wardrobe. Secondly, there's no padding to protect from the beatings the child would surely receive from other children, and possibly some homeowners. Lastly, "WTF?!" Perhaps that mouth-breathing child should have went with the "Atari Asteroids" costume instead:

Better, but there are still issues. The head says "space debris", the body says "fun VCS cartridge" and the legs say "none of the above". Then there's the tragic story of the child from Nebraska who wore this and was shot in the face by a floating triangle...

That's about it for my bitching about an otherwise fun holiday. I'm going to go pick up a couple of bags of my favorite "fun-sized" candy and hope to God no kids come around so I get to keep it all to myself.