This is why Halloween works

I buy into Halloween: the candy, the costumes, and the scary movies. I gave an informative speech my senior year of high school talking about Halloween. Here’s how my speech went: history of Halloween, Halloween today, and why girls dress like streetwalkers. True story. I really did. Here’s how the history of Halloween goes:

Once in a land long ago, there was a ritual called some name I don’t remember. People believed in this ritual that it was the one time of year that spirits would roam the earth. They dressed in masks to throw off the spirits so they wouldn’t attack them or some such belief. I know it sounds like I don’t know anything, but I promise I got an A on this speech. It was just too many years ago. Back to the story.

There was once a girl who believed her mask needed to attract that of a toolbox-frat-spirit and decided to make her mask even smaller than the rest of the maidens in the land. The rest of the lasses took note of this and decided to follow suit. Every year the masks got smaller and smaller until one day, POOF! No more masks. The people of the land were completely shocked. All of the young ladies’ faces were bare. The spirits could see their faces for what they truly were: girls looking for attention, probably with some sort of family issues.

Snap back to current day Halloween. I know this topic has been beaten to a pulp, but I just don’t really understand how dressing provocatively got started. (By the way, obviously all of that was made up. Except for the part where I got an A. I really got an A). I have respect for girls that can rock a costume that flaunts their curves and whatnot, but I have little respect for girls that wear nothing and a headband. Then again, it’s their choice and not mine. If they want to dress like that, to each their own.  I’ll stick to watching scary movies.

I just love Halloween. If that means that girls dress in a way I don’t like, then I don’t have to look. And I know that. There’s a theory that bad things have to exist to make the good ones even better, such as Gangnam style exists to make [insert your favorite genre] even better. So girls wear non-costumes to make my Pink Power Ranger costume even more awesome. And so for that, I love the non-costumes. And I can live with that.

This is why being adventurous is good

This past weekend I chose to do things differently. My school has a Fall Break at the midway point of the semester and I guess it’s supposed to be a time to catch up on schoolwork, although most choose to spend it catching up with missed shows, obviously. I wanted to do something differently. I didn’t want to just sit at home like I always do. So I didn’t. I went out with friends, to a museum, shopping, I even was impulsive and cut my bangs myself.

Life is all about being impulsive. I was worried each time I went out that I might be too tired or start to not feel well. I was worried that the people I saw along the way would be rude and mean. And for some reason that enables this irrational fear I have that the people will not like me and I’ll die or get arrested or something equally ridiculous. Some advice to 20-somethings everywhere, museum folk love the young-ins’. They hardly ever see young people, so when they do, the people that work there want to help with everything. I realized I wasn’t going to die.

Did I get tired quickly? Yes. But I was with awesome friends the whole time and so I was having too much fun to stop. I also had fun without dressing like a pole dancer and without doing anything illegal. Like I said, life is all about impulsivity. I mean cutting your own hair is scary. But I’ve done it before (never to this extent) and so I knew I could do it again. I also cut my friend Hillary’s hair just to do it. Don’t get me wrong, she asked me and it was fully consensual.

But being impulsive isn’t always good, right? Wrong. Why not be impulsive? So what you spend too much money or make a wrong turn in Mexico. All of life is a learning experience anyway. So I might have ruined my hair or potentially had an awful time. Years from now I would’ve had a good story. Please don’t take that to mean you should go buy a car if you don’t have the money and it leads to a lifetime of debt. I guess I’m being cliché and saying take chances. And I guess one bad thing did happen this Fall Break. I did not get one ounce of homework done. Womp womp womp.

(WOOO DIY bangs!)

P.S. It's not like I'm going to free fall from space like that one guy did this past week. I guess I'm trying to say "YOLO" but way more eloquently because people who say "YOLO" are idiots. 

This is why pumpkins are the selected food of God

There comes a time in every person’s life where a make-or-break decision must be made. This decision is what kind of person you’re going to decide to be. Are you going to be a pumpkin-eater, or not?

It sounds silly but it really decides who you are. There’s that rhyme that says “Cheater, cheater, pumpkin eater.” That’s a heavy burden. It’s basically saying that if I choose to eat pumpkin or pumpkin products, I am by nature a cheater. That’s such a negative connotation. Who decided that pumpkins are the food choice of scandalous people? Well if eating pumpkin is wrong, then I don’t want to be right.

There’s something so heart-warming about eating a pumpkin muffin, or brownie, or yogurt, or pie, in the middle of the fall, nay, autumn. Even the mere utterance of the word “pumpkin” deserves the usage of the word “autumn.” Pumpkins are that special. Pumpkins are just the perfect flavor for the changing of the time. The arrival of the cooler weather is something to be praised, as it is blisteringly hot here in Texas. Pumpkins are also the mascot of Halloween. So if you love Halloween, you obviously love pumpkins.

Apparently there has been a pumpkin shortage as of late. Even Starbucks has turned away customers for their pumpkin spice latte drink because of it selling out. That’s how much the public loves pumpkin. I guess some people hate it. And those people are very wrong. You can’t hate something that brings happiness to so many as a beacon of hope. And yet, some still do. That’s okay. It leaves more for us pumpkin-lovers. 

This is why elections cannot be fun

This post was inevitable. We’re getting closer and closer to elections; you had to have known deep down that I was going to have a post about politics. You just had to have known. I’ll try to keep it as civil as possible, but if you want to jump ship now, I don’t blame you.

I have a problem with these elections. I’m 89% sure it’s because this is the first presidential election in which I’ve been legally eligible to vote. I voted for governor in 2010 and no one bothered me then. I also didn’t pay as close attention because I was just starting college. But when you have Rick Perry as one of the two main options, you don’t really have to pay much attention to know who to vote for. Yet somehow, he was still elected. Thanks Texas Republicans.

For the record, I’m not a Republican nor am I’m not a Democrat, either. I think both parties are way too corrupt. Actually I think the system is way too corrupt but for some reason I still have a little bit of faith in our leaders. So what’s the point? I’m coming out and saying please please please research everything before you choose to vote or who to vote for. Notice I say “if you choose to vote” because after researching everything you might not want to vote anymore. At this point that’s kind of how I feel. I’m pretty ready when it comes to who I’m voting for, for presidency. But there are things like “Texas Railroad Commissioner” who doesn’t even work with trains! They work with oil, or something.

Also, this isn’t a dictatorship, so it’s not like the president decides everything. Congress has a bit of a say in that. Same with other things. But in case you forgot how electing a president works here’s how:

So that being said, that’s why I think it’s ridiculous. It’s the Electoral College versus the popular vote. I don’t see why we don’t use the popular vote. The Electoral College seems easily rigged to me. I guess that’s to account for all the idiots who will vote for someone based on trivial matters, such as if they play a sport or not. I know someone who is voting Obama because he plays basketball. Seriously? Vote for who you want but at least know something about each candidate.

On a side note, that debate was crazy! Romney was cutting off the moderator every 10 seconds; Obama seemed in a Denver-induced stupor; Big Bird was threatened. But I digress. The commercials are full of propaganda too. There is little fact behind a lot of them and some of the commercials don’t even apply to the districts where they are being broadcasted.

So get informed, get educated, and please don’t vote for someone just because they play basketball. 

This is why video games aren't for me

Perhaps I am setting out on forbidden territory but I hate when my brother plays video games. I realize it’s not in my jurisdiction to talk about this, since I am not much of a “gamer,” but he just gets way too into it. He’ll sit there for hours playing Super Smash Bros and utters every cuss word imaginable when something goes awry. And the way he has it set up is so that no one can cross without him pausing which causes him to get even angrier and utter more cuss words.

So of course I get really annoyed by girls who claim to play all types of video games and actually do not. No, half-naked girl holding a controller, no one cares. I have complete respect for girls who can hang with the guys without looking like they’re trying too hard, but other than that I am completely perplexed by this notion of playing games that just get them mad.

I imagine that to gamers video games are like books: they have a story and meaning behind them. You can get lost in them and can discover a part of yourself just by playing a game. To this, I sigh. But I guess whatever makes you happy, right?

When I was younger I played all the expected games, such as Pokémon and Legend of Zelda; but until recently I thought Minecraft and Minesweeper were the same thing so that shows how much I’ve strayed from them. I hate to be a stereotypical person who dislikes video games but I just see them as nothing more than something that stresses out my brother. He claims they are really fun, but I don’t know.

As I’m watching him play SSB I can’t believe that I ever used to play it. I tried playing it a few months ago, and was horrible. I also didn’t get any fun out of it. So sorry fellas, I’ll never be one of those girls that will game with you. But I see plenty of half naked girls who claim to play. Maybe you can play with them, because they are totally just so good at video games.