Monday, October 31, 2011

All Hallows Eve


Back in the mid 80's when I was in college, Halloween revolved around huge costume parties on "The Hill." This was where numerous Frat Houses would mix up the grain punch, tap the kegs, hire the bands and it would get ugly. College kids from all over road-tripped to Bethlehem, PA for the Halloween festivities.Thousands of dressed up and intoxicated undergrads letting loose in the way only costumed anonymity allows. The parties were on the Saturday night closest to the actual Holiday. You would stumble around the Hill from party to party, swill beers, dance to cover bands,get knee-walkin' hammered and crack up at the various creative and not-so-creative costumes. You saw the requisite paper-mache genetalia, the transvestites and the ghouls,the superheroes and M&M's. One year the boys and I went as "The Wanderers." The next year we did the "Temptations" complete with matching shrimp-colored ruffle front tux shirts and tuxes from a thrift store.
Once the parties on the Hill were over, we basically forgot about the scheduled Halloween trick-or-treating facet of this gig. Junior year we were sitting around the living room of our of-campus house having a few beers and the door bell rang. It was about 7:30 and some neighborhood kids from South Bethlehem were trick or treating. As a house of college age knuckleheads, we neither anticpated kids nor had any candy. The poor souls who hit our house that evening were treated to slices of white bread and cigarettes in their treat bag. The next day a few parents stopped by to complain.We sheepishly explained it was the "trick" portion of the evening and apologized.

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