Each week I answer questions people send me in a soon-to-be award-winning column called Ask Wessel. Please send any and all questions to me on Twitter or email DanaJWessel@gmail.com. The weirder the better.
Q: Is it worth it to dress up for halloween in the comfort of your own home during the pandy? zoom halloween party? pls address. – Morgan
Halloween is just going to be the latest Pandy crotch-kick we will have to deal with this year. Of course Halloween actually falls on a Saturday this year, adding even more 2020 to a year that has already been so full of 2020.
If dressing up in the comfort of your own home on Halloween is something that sounds fun and will bring you joy then you should 100% do it. Dress up every day, Halloween or no. Why not? I am all about people finding whatever happiness they can during these shitty days.
Same with Zoom Halloween parties. If it sounds fun dressing up on Zoom with your friends and keeps your crew safe? Hell yeah. If I am being honest, I think I would rather be the character who gets the most grisly death from Michael Meyers in a Halloween movie than do a Halloween Zoom party but don’t grumpy ol’ me stop you.
Personally, I feel the worst for kids. Everyone has such great memories of going out Trick-or-Treating as a kid. Now Halloween 2020 for these kids will be the equivalent to that annoying house on your block growing up that gave out toothbrushes to T-or-Ters.
We gotta get creative to help out the kids. Not sure exactly what that looks like. Maybe toss candy to them from the top of your driveway? Deliver a bunch of candy to kids in your neighborhood ding-dong-ditch style Halloween afternoon? Maybe let them let eat as much candy as they want on Halloween without any restrictions? This is the portion of the post where I remind people I don’t have kids.
Or maybe the whole thing will be a wash anyway because Minnesota gets a massive blizzard Halloween night? Not as crazy as it sounds, ya know. Little known fact, but that happened once when I was a kid. It was Halloween 1991…
My baby sister is somehow now a freshman in college and it got me and my husband talking about the awful alcohol combinations everyone ended up drinking freshman year. We decided the worst we ever had was shots of brandy with warm Kool Aid chaser because we didn’t have ice in the dorms. What about you? – Melanie
Brandy and warm Kool-Aid? Woof. Next time I am thinking about shoving some unhealthy food in my mouth that I will regret I will instead just picture drinking brandy and warm Kool-Aid and gag so hard I am no longer hungry.
Whether by necessity – it was all you and your friends could get your underage hands on – or pure stupidity, every college kid has a story about drinking something so unholy it makes them cringe for the rest of their days.
The one that makes me shudder the most when I see them on the shelf at stores today is all those horrible flavors of Bacardi. Bacardi O, Bacardi Limon, Bacardi Razz, etc. And like your Brandy/Kool Aid, Melanie, it was always mixed with whatever was available – Mountain Dew, Gatorade, orange juice, milk, etc. My girlfriend at the time loved Bacardi Coco. I just shuddered typing that.
I also remember how the drinks were always so damn warm. Somehow getting into college was something we could all accomplish at that age but grasping concepts like ‘ice’ and ‘ideal beverage temperature’ was something we couldn’t wrap our heads around.
I know colleges would never do it because suburban parents would freak out and and accuse them of promoting underage drinking, but they really should put together a video or something with the tone of, “OK, listen, we hope you don’t drink underage, but since you probably will, here are some common sense things you should know…” Get some dumb YouTuber or TikTok star to record it so the kids will actually pay attention. Do I really have to come up with all the good ideas?
Growing up, why was there always at least one kid around every campfire that ruined smores because they kept waving a burning stick around? How often was that kid also the same kid that had trouble understanding the problem with dumping gas on a burning fire? – Owen
Owen…I was that kid. I was 100% that kid. I cannot explain my actions. On behalf of all of those That Kids everywhere, I apologize for ruining everyone’s campfires growing up. Now that I think about it, I guess I am That Adult now as well…
On that note, time to wrap things up! Thanks as always for reading this dumb website. It means the world to me. Hope everyone is good! Reach out if you need anything.
Dana Wessel 