In some respects I consider myself a pretty brave person. I volunteered to be the first aider at my old job. My tool of choice for body-hair removal is an epilator. I have told at least five Italians that I hate coffee. In spite of these irrefutable acts of courage, however, I must admit that I do experience fear on a regular basis. Halloween, simultaneously a celebration and a mockery of all things scary, would seem to be the ideal forum in which to express those fears. Let's be honest, though; if you're reading this blog you probably don't find witches, ghosts, or Frankenstein's monsters particularly scary. Sure, you might jump out of your skin at a horror film now and again, but is anyone over the age of twelve being kept awake at night by thoughts of Count Dracula? I expect not.
Many of us still have fears in our twenties and beyond, and many of us don't know how to deal with these fears because society has left us emotionally unequipped to do so. I propose that the first step in doing so is to incorporate them into our Halloween costumes, and, to start off what I have no doubt will become the accepted Halloween practice across the world in a couple of years, here are some things that I find legitimately terrifying that you can dress up as this Halloween.
Kim Jong-un and Donald Trump
According to a statistic that I just made up, around sixty per cent of people in monogamous relationships are only in them so they can wear a couple's costume at Halloween. Couple's costumes are great because you can put much less effort in than if you're dressing up solo but still look like you tried. Literature, film, and folklore have brought us hundreds of creepy couples to choose from, but, as much as we all love Gomez and Morticia Addams, they can't cause you to wake up sweating in the night quite like Donald and Jong-un and the threat of nuclear apocalypse that accompanies them and their total unsuitability for being heads of state.
What you'll need: The key to this costume is truly terrible hair. One looks like a Shoreditch hipster channelling a Puritan nine-year-old, and the other looks like a toupee made of blonde gas. Once you have the hair sorted you can pretty much throw on a suit and you'll be convincing. Please note that any kind of Asian-face make-up is absolutely not acceptable. Painting yourself orange to mimic the unique luminosity of Trump's skin, however, is.
What you'll need: The key to this costume is truly terrible hair. One looks like a Shoreditch hipster channelling a Puritan nine-year-old, and the other looks like a toupee made of blonde gas. Once you have the hair sorted you can pretty much throw on a suit and you'll be convincing. Please note that any kind of Asian-face make-up is absolutely not acceptable. Painting yourself orange to mimic the unique luminosity of Trump's skin, however, is.
Slugs in a house
Anyone who's ever lived in damp rental accommodation knows the piercing stab of fear in your gut when you come downstairs in the morning and see a fresh slug trail. Slugs are bad enough when they are outside, but when they enter into your home they bring with them a horror like no other. I once opened my tea-towel drawer while living in a particularly grotty student abode and found myself face-to-whatever-slugs-have with one, so I can tell you from first-hand experience that it is far scarier than any horror film could hope to be.
What you'll need: This is an ideal costume for those on a budget. Simply cover yourself in a slime-like substance (Vaseline is a cheap and easy option) and lie around in parts of the house where no one wants you to be.
What you'll need: This is an ideal costume for those on a budget. Simply cover yourself in a slime-like substance (Vaseline is a cheap and easy option) and lie around in parts of the house where no one wants you to be.
Unexpected council tax demands
Nothing strikes fear into the heart of a recent graduate like a letter from their local authority.* Council tax is confusing, often handled incorrectly, and quite expensive, meaning you could one day find out you haven't been paying your dues for eight months and you now owe a local governing body over a grand. If that prospect doesn't give you a fright then you're probably fabulously wealthy and therefore can't really relate to anything on this blog in the first place.
What you'll need: You probably have a few of these in that post pile that you and your housemates make on the kitchen counter but never deal with. Have a root around amongst the Domino's vouchers you say you'll use but don't because you just find a code online every time and the post from previous tenants that you know you should just write 'no longer at this address' on and shove back in a post box but never do because you always forget, and the nearest post box is actually a good three or four-minute walk away, and you're not going to make a special trip just to send Mr L P Morton his bank statement that he can just check online anyway, are you? You'll probably find a council tax demand in there somewhere that you can staple to an old T-shirt. If you're one of these organised people who can't think of anything better to do with their time than sort their post then you might have to make one yourself. Just write your local authority name in blue – it's always blue, for some reason; I wonder if they mistakenly think the colour is soothing enough to calm the rage that ensues when you realise the people whose job it is to calculate your council tax correctly have not calculated your council tax correctly – and write 'AMOUNT DUE' next to a large sum of your invention. This could be done directly onto a T-shirt in sharpie, on paper that you then attach to yourself, or some kind of home-fashioned sandwich board. Finish the costume off by wandering around all night with the dulled, defeated eyes of someone who has spent half an hour on hold waiting to be able to speak to an actual person and listening to the same Ed Sheeran song on repeat.
What you'll need: You probably have a few of these in that post pile that you and your housemates make on the kitchen counter but never deal with. Have a root around amongst the Domino's vouchers you say you'll use but don't because you just find a code online every time and the post from previous tenants that you know you should just write 'no longer at this address' on and shove back in a post box but never do because you always forget, and the nearest post box is actually a good three or four-minute walk away, and you're not going to make a special trip just to send Mr L P Morton his bank statement that he can just check online anyway, are you? You'll probably find a council tax demand in there somewhere that you can staple to an old T-shirt. If you're one of these organised people who can't think of anything better to do with their time than sort their post then you might have to make one yourself. Just write your local authority name in blue – it's always blue, for some reason; I wonder if they mistakenly think the colour is soothing enough to calm the rage that ensues when you realise the people whose job it is to calculate your council tax correctly have not calculated your council tax correctly – and write 'AMOUNT DUE' next to a large sum of your invention. This could be done directly onto a T-shirt in sharpie, on paper that you then attach to yourself, or some kind of home-fashioned sandwich board. Finish the costume off by wandering around all night with the dulled, defeated eyes of someone who has spent half an hour on hold waiting to be able to speak to an actual person and listening to the same Ed Sheeran song on repeat.
Sexy Jacob Rees-Mogg
People have been using Halloween as an excuse to show some skin since time immemorial, and there's no reason you can't be both scary and sexy (Christian Slater's character in Heathers, anyone?). If you want to carry on the tradition of skimpy Halloween costumes while scaring the shit out of your fellow party-goers then Sexy Jacob Rees-Mogg is the outfit for you. Not only is the idea of seeing Rees-Mogg in a state of undress basically the most unappealing thing to ever exist, any kind of sexual encounter with him would be doubly terrifying as he would ban you from using contraception, force you to carry any conceived child to term, and ensure you got absolutely no help from the state whatsoever in raising, feeding, or educating it.
What you'll need: A Jacob Rees-Mogg mask, a pair of leather chaps, and a strong stomach.
What you'll need: A Jacob Rees-Mogg mask, a pair of leather chaps, and a strong stomach.
*I have a theory that Bristol City Council waits for bad things to happen to me and then sends me bills when I am too emotionally drained to question what they are billing me for and so pay up without a fight. I have evidence to back this up.
